>>1939647>the costs of supplying it into considerationOperating ratios were in the 75 - 80 range throughout the postwar period, showing no real trend. Postwar net income peaked in 1955, had a smaller peak in 1966, then collapsed by 1970, not coincidentally, the year before Amtrak was established. Let's use the New York Central Railroad as a test case. They were one of the USA's biggest railroads, had a high profile passenger operation, and were part of the largest bankruptcy in corporate history to that point in 1970. Again, not coincidentally, the year before Amtrak was established. In the 1949 and 1950 annual reports they complain a lot about federal taxes/subsidies for other transportation modes, but are otherwise optimistic/foward-looking with regard to passenger operations, bringing new equipment/facilities on-line even as they acknowledged losses in the passenger/mail division. They wanted fairer treatment from the government; they weren't demanding divestment from the sector.
>do your figures account for inflation and population growth?Figures are nominal, though we wouldn't expect those to affect the relative balance between different modes of land transport, except where regional differences in population growth (like in the Sunbelt) tended to favor trucking while growth in traditional industrial areas slowed down.
