Chief Executives, has passed only minor remedial legislation since 1945 despite exposure to seven major transportation studies, and at least one of these bills hasn't taken hold. The Transportation Act of 1958 specifically instructed the I.C.C. to allow those rates which reflect a carrier's inherent advantages, and for a while thereafter the Commission SO ruled. Yet in recent months the regulatory body has become increasingly restrictive, disallowing several rail rate proposals on grounds that their effect would be to injure or destroy road or water conpetition. The ability of the railroads to make money with such rates was not questioned. Politically speaking, of course, Congress is under great pressure to preserve the status quo, and as yet the industry has not allocated the necessary money to mount an effective public information program-the A.A.R.'s Magna Carta effort notwithstanding.

What about the work-rules issue?

The Presidential Commission has conIcluded its hearings and will issue its report very soon. Recommendations are binding on neither the carriers nor the unions but should have a profound influence upon opinion at all levels.

How about President Kennedy?

He requested and has received a transport report from Secretary of Commerce Luther Hodges. As yet nobody has revealed the contents of the report; less, of course, is known about what reaction the President will have or what action Congress would take on any recommendations he might make.

What are the symptoms of the carriers' illness and its seriousness?

A thousand and one things, not all of them in the headlines. For example, investor disinterest (Wall Street has few, if any, analysts who can afford to work on railroad securities full time); the state of the railroad supply industry (in 1960 carbuilders could have produced "without sweat" 120,000 cars, actually built less than 20,000); Congressional apathy over the collapse of New Haven; the frantic merge-or-die nature of such Eastern consolidation proceedings as PRR+Lehigh Valley; inadequate research (the industry needs a fully automatic coupler which contains air brake lines, yet has neither a working prototype nor the money to finance a quick changeover); the number of loans, now totaling 153 million dollars, which the railroads could not have secured from private financing without I.C.C. guarantees; the rise of nonregulated carriage (which now accounts for fourth of intercity freight ton-miles and could hit 40 per cent by 1975); aging equipment (average age of freight cars is 19 years, 10,000 diesel units are ripe for upgrading, production of noncommuter passenger equipment virtually ceased years ago); and so forth. However, it may be intelligently argued that abandonment of NYO&W, much of the passenger service cutback, sale of surplus property, and like activity was inevitable and does not necessarily constitute evidence of disease.

What will happen?

a

In the East (where almost half of the 40 class 1 roads operated in the red for

the first eight months of 1961) the current chaos implies wholesale bankruptcy in the event of a prolonged recession. Even if the rails aren't allowed to diversify into other modes of transport and equitable user-charges aren't placed on their competition, a regulatory change permitting the industry rate-making freedom could postpone the danger indefinitely. Failing that, though, and assuming many more New Havens, we must reckon with some kind of Government intervention. Outright public ownership is politically remote. More likely would be some sort of subsidy. say, tax forgiveness, low-interest loans, Government assumption of maintenance of way expenses (which would tend to equate the rails and their competition, who neither build nor maintain their right of way), or outright purchase and lease-back of fixed facilities. Worth remembering, too, is the fact that previous railroad crises have spurred demands for I.C.C.-authored master merger plans. It could happen again.

Rutland . . . another NYO&W?

In 1955 a railroad trade magazine splashed on its cover a color photo of green-and-yellow hood units leading green-and-yellow box cars across a truss bridge, to kick off a lead story entitled "The Modern Rutland - Green Mountain Miracle." Less than a month before Christmas 1961 Rutland Railway filed a petition with the I.C.C. to abandon its entire 331.7-mile operation in the states of Vermont and New York. The apparent revival of the 1950's had collapsed. Who, if anyone, was directly responsible remained an unpublished tale as snow fell on unplowed rails.

Rutland has never been a gold mine, of course. For generations the centuryold line was the unwanted stepchild of such competitors as Central Vermont and New York Central. Outright abandonment seemed inevitable when the road slid into a 12-year bankruptcy in 1938, and when the property was reorganized in 1950 its plant was in mint condition - to antiquarians. Except for four Alco 4-8-2's with 1946 data plates, there wasn't an engine or a freight car under 25 years of age on the roster; a vintage passenger service accounted for half of all trainmiles and lost nearly $400,000 a year; and the operating ratio stood at 94.17 per cent. At the time TRAINS suggested with not quite mock seriousness that the Government finance the Rutland as an operating museum piece, "so unstained by progress" was the company.

But progress did come. Rutland dieselized with 16 Alco hood units, cut off passenger service (in the wake of a

COMING SOON

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three-week strike in 1953), trimmed the payroll from over 1100 to fewer than 500 employees, bought more than 400 new freight cars, and — beginning in 1955entered a five-year period of solvency.

In spite of dog-eat-dog competition for business (45 per cent of its traffic is received from and delivered to connections), Rutland held its own, ran on time, and looked toward completion of the nearby St. Lawrence Seaway to boost on-line industrialization.

But last year Rutland, minus the management team that had hauled it into the black, posted a 100.78 per cent operating ratio and lost $369,525. Labor bitterness climaxed in a strike by operating employees September 25, 1961, which shut down all service. The present owners decided October 23 to apply for abandonment but did not actually file until December 1, when management rejected a proposal by Secretary of Labor Goldberg to arbitrate the strike issues. No attempt has been made to sell the road as an operating entity since the owners feel it could not break even in the foreseeable future, much less make money.

Vermont, in which 213 of the Rutland's miles are located, is having Coverdale & Colpitts survey the line's economic worth to determine whether it would prove worth anyone's while to pay the road's estimated salvage value of 5.7 million dollars and crank up its green-and-yellow hood units again.

Wishbone railroad

Chicago-headquartered 862-mile Chicago & Eastern Illinois now knows what it's like to be a wishbone. Its fork-shaped route out of Chicago reaches to (1) St. Louis and Thebes, Ill., both gateway ininterchange points with Missouri Pacific: and (2) Evansville, Ind., where connection is made with Louisville & Nashville. Both connections want control of C&EL L&N has purchased 27.5 per cent of C&EI common, and Mopac has bought 17.3 per cent of C&EI common plus 31.3 per cent of its Class A shares. Both buyers lack a direct entrance into Chicago, neither wants to share control of C&EI (although L&N has hinted that it would if necessary), and nobody has suggested the obvious alternative of simply dividing C&EI up the middle and parceling out its St. Louis-Thebes and Evansville mains to the appropriate connections (with dual ownership of the first 81.8 miles out of Chicago to Woodland, Ill., where the lines divide). Meanwhile, Illinois Central in no mood to see either L&N or Mopac get a Windy City foothold - has blandly proposed that it "be permitted to share control of the C&EI equally with the L&N and MP and with such other roads

as may also desire to be a party to joint control," a step which would effectively neutralize C&EI for good. Just to make matters more confusing, IC itself continues to be interested in a merger with Mopac.

Elsewhere:

Astute Stuart T. Saunders of Norfolk & Western has used his coal hauler's good credit to knock down one more roadblock to his plan for unification of N&W, NKP, and Wabash. In exchange for having the smaller line withdraw its bid to join the big merger, N&W has offered to buy all the outstanding stock of Akron, Canton & Youngstown for 6.5 million dollars. The all-Ohio AC&Y operates 171 route-miles, owns 17 diesels and 1600 freight cars, has been in the black since 1938 and a dividend-payer since 1947, is very big in Akron (where it handles 35 to 40 per cent of all rail service), and is an important bridge-route connection for Nickel Plate.

The 841-mile Western Maryland is behaving more independently than its ownership would suggest. Baltimore & Ohio owns 42.85 per cent of WM's preferred and common stock; and Chesapeake & Ohio, hot after control of B&O, has purchased 14 per cent of WM common. Moreover, both C&O and B&O have announced that WM will be included in their long-range merger blueprints. However, WM President W. Arthor Grotz says his road is open to "any merger proposal." No reaction yet from Baltimore or Cleveland.

Merger is apparently a bad word on the New Frontier. The Justice Department is opposing Coast Line + Seaboard as well as control of Western Pacific by either Santa Fe or Southern Pacific.

BEYOND THE ATLANTIC

ROBERT SPARK

R.I.P. FOR THE SOE: From May 27, 1962, some well-established European international named trains will either disappear or be drastically curtailed. Among them is, perhaps, one of the most famous - the

Simplon-Orient Express. The SOE becomes just the Simplon Express and will run only as far as Trieste. This is not much farther than the first Simplon Express, which started operation in 1906 between Paris and Venice, following the opening of the Simplon Tunnel. It was on April 15, 1919, that it commenced running as the Simplon-Orient Express and included through cars to Istanbul, Athens, and Bucharest. The creation of the SOE had a political motive because it was the Allied Governments at Versailles after World War I who plumped for a train which would link the Western powers and the Balkan states. Another train which also arose out of post-World War I political problems was the Arlberg Orient Express which came into being in 1922. Like the SOE, it will also be cut back (terminating at Vienna) and bear a revised name (just Arlberg Express).

A third express, the Tauern, serving eastern Europe (it first appeared in the timetables in 1953) will also cease operations in its present form. It will terminate at Klagenfurt in Austria. Two other trains - the Tirol and Yugoslavia Expresses will also be discontinued.

The reasons for the discontinuance or change in these trains are basically economic. It does not pay to operate cars right across Europe when for part of their journey they may be lightly patronized and earning little revenue for their owners. Also, some of the long-distance named trains virtually degenerate into all-stations locals when they get into Eastern Europe.

To those who cherish riding the same car all the way from Paris to Istanbul or Athens there is a new train: the Direct Orient Express. This will depart, eastbound, from Paris at 11:50 p.m., be in Milan at lunch time the following day, call at Trieste in the evening, and pause at Belgrade at breakfast time on the third day. Fourth-day arrivals will be 10 a.m. for the Athens section and 1:20 p.m. for the Istanbul cars. A first-class WagonsLits will run to Athens three times a week and to Istanbul twice a week, so for the spies and mystery writers (not to mention railfans) all is not lost.

ON-TIME ELECTRICS: On October 2, 1961, Glasgow's blue-painted A.C. electrics started running again after an absence of nearly a year (they were withdrawn in 1960 after electrical troubles). After 53 days of operation British Railways' Scottish Region issued a progress report. In brief: the trains were running satisfactorily and maintaining a high standard of punctuality. Take Friday, October 13- an ominous date, but not for the "blue trains." Of the 326 trains running, 318 arrived on time, a punctuality figure of 97.6 per cent. The remaining trains were an average of

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LUCIUS BEEBE AND CHARLES CLEGG

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