Opinion

In general, 2024 was “a tough year” for the industry, but the situation “has shifted far more toward the positive and will continue to do so in 2025.” That’s the…

Riders on New Jersey Transit’s rail lines had to do without their trains for four days in the middle of May, due to a strike by engineers represented by the…

We upgrade shares of Norfolk Southern and CSX to Buy as the likelihood of rail consolidation moves up considerably. A Union Pacific bid for NSC likely results in a BNSF…

This is obviously the topic of the day, with lots of different aspects to it. Given this is an operations and service report, here’s the past 75 years of industry…

Class I merger talk comes back to center stage as the Wall Street Journal reports Union Pacific is in early discussions with Norfolk Southern. We hosted a call with Littlejohn…

Change, change and more change. I’ve experienced huge technological and operational advancements during the course of my 50-plus year career in Tech.

As Innovation Week comes to a close, few sectors better illustrate the quiet power of American ingenuity than freight rail—where century-old infrastructure is being reimagined with cutting-edge technology to move…

TD Cowen recently hosted a call with industry executives from the rail equipment market. From that, we heard order books are seeing no notable growth, attributable to tariff uncertainty, and…

Given the Fourth of July effect in the most recent weekly data, we’ll give Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) a break from our weekly critique as it continues to try…

Our friends at Texas Rail Advocates (led by our own Chair Emeritus Peter LeCody) reported July 10 that the North Central Texas Council of Governments Regional Transportation Council has come…

FROM THE EDITOR, RAILWAY AGE JULY 2025 ISSUE: Consolidation: “The action or process of making something stronger or more solid,” or, “The action or process of combining a number of…

“California Dreamin’” was one of the iconic songs of the sixties. It was about an Angelino enduring a New York winter and dreaming about his warm hometown (the inverse of…

Most “transit railroads” in the United States (and GO Transit, which serves Canada’s Toronto area) provide a full span of service on most or all their lines, although there are…

As the proverb provides, “Be careful for what you wish,” as wishes sometimes deliver unintended consequences. Railroads may have experienced a wishes backfire July 8 when the U.S. 7th Circuit…

Pricing expectations stalled in second-quarter 2025 and remain below our rail shipper survey’s long-term average. Business growth fell modestly sequentially to levels not seen since COVID. Economic confidence improved marginally,…

Amtrak’s long-term closure of one of the tunnel tubes (Amtrak calls them “lines”) under the East River between Penn Station and Queens remains controversial. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, other…

There has been much talk lately about increasing participation by the private sector when it comes to running passenger trains in the United States. Brightline’s Florida operation and the company’s…

FINANCIAL EDGE, RAILWAY AGE JULY 2025 ISSUE: At the 11th annual Rail Insights conference, participants from the Class I railroads and government and equipment sectors discussed the industry for the…

WATCHING WASHINGTON, RAILWAY AGE, JULY 2025 ISSUE: What is more delightfully amusing than a paradox—that we park on driveways and drive on parkways; that foul is fair when batted baseballs collide…

Without volume and market share growth, the Class I’s may be at risk—or be forced to look at merging. Investors continue to await the next leg of Class I railroad…