CSX Transportation, known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad company operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates on approximately 21,000 route miles (34,000 km) of track. The company operates as the leading subsidiary of CSX Corporation, a Fortune 500 company headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida.
The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States. Headquartered in Atlanta, the company was formed in 1982 with the merger of the Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway. The company operates 19,420 route miles in 22 eastern states, the District of Columbia, and has rights in Canada over the Albany to Montréal route of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Norfolk Southern Railway is the leading subsidiary of the Norfolk Southern Corporation.
The Monongahela Railway was a coal-hauling short line railroad in Pennsylvania and West Virginia in the United States. It was jointly controlled originally by the Pennsylvania Railroad, New York Central subsidiary Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad, and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, with NYC and PRR later succeeded by Penn Central Transportation. The company operated its own line until it was merged into Conrail on May 1, 1993.
CSX Corporation is an American holding company focused on rail transportation and real estate in North America, among other industries. The company was established in 1980 as part of the Chessie System and Seaboard Coast Line Industries merger. The various railroads of the former Chessie System and Seaboard Coast Line Industries that are now owned by CSX Corporation were eventually merged into a single line in 1986 and it became known as CSX Transportation. CSX Corporation currently has a number of subsidiaries beyond CSX Transportation. Previously based in Richmond, Virginia after the merger, the corporation moved its headquarters to Jacksonville, Florida, in 2003. CSX is a Fortune 500 company.
Conrail, formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do business as an asset management and network services provider in three Shared Assets Areas that were excluded from the division of its operations during its acquisition by CSX Corporation and the Norfolk Southern Railway.
The Cleveland Short Line Railway is a freight bypass around southern Cleveland, Ohio, in the United States. A quasi-independent railroad organized by major shareholders of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway, the shortline was intended to allow the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern to bypass the congested railroads in downtown Cleveland. The Cleveland Short Line has had a succession of owners, and is currently part of CSX Transportation.
The Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway was a major part of the Pennsylvania Railroad system, extending the PRR west from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, via Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Chicago, Illinois. It included the current Norfolk Southern-owned Fort Wayne Line east of Crestline, Ohio, to Pittsburgh, and the Fort Wayne Secondary, owned by CSX, from Crestline west to Tolleston in Gary, Indiana. CSX leased its entire portion in 2004 to the Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad (CFE). The remaining portion of the line from Tolleston into Chicago is now part of the Norfolk Southern's Chicago District, with a small portion of the original PFW&C trackage abandoned in favor of the parallel lines of former competitors which are now part of the modern NS system.
The Conrail Lehigh Line is a railroad line in New Jersey that is part of Conrail Shared Assets Operations under the North Jersey Shared Assets Area division. The line runs from CP Port Reading Junction in Manville to Oak Island Yard in Newark. The line is double-track and signaled through its entire length. The line began operations in 1999 using former existing tracks from Manville to Newark that was once part of the original Lehigh Line which is still in existence and is owned and operated by Norfolk Southern Railway.
The Buffalo and Pittsburgh Railroad is a Class II railroad operating in New York and Pennsylvania.
Cleveland has been and continues to be deeply rooted in railroad history.
The Fort Wayne Line and Fort Wayne Secondary is a rail line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad (CFE), and CSX Transportation in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana. The line runs from Pittsburgh, west via Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Gary, Indiana, along what was once the Pennsylvania Railroad's Pittsburgh to Chicago main line.
The Western New York and Pennsylvania Railroad is a short-line railroad that operates freight trains in Western New York and Northwest Pennsylvania, United States. The company is controlled by the Livonia, Avon and Lakeville Railroad, with which it does not connect. It started operations in 2001 on the Southern Tier Extension, a former Erie Railroad line between Hornell, NY and Corry, PA, owned by the public Chautauqua, Cattaraugus, Allegany and Steuben Southern Tier Extension Railroad Authority (STERA). Through acquisitions and leases, the line was extended from Corry to Meadville, PA in 2002 and to Oil City, PA in 2006. In 2007, the WNY&P leased and sub-leased portions of the north-south Buffalo Line, a former Pennsylvania Railroad line mostly built by a predecessor of the defunct Western New York and Pennsylvania Railway. The two lines cross at Olean, NY.
The following is a brief history of the North American rail system, mainly through major changes to Class I railroads, the largest class by operating revenue.
The Lehigh Line is a railroad line in central New Jersey, Northeastern Pennsylvania, and the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. It is owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway. The line runs west from the vicinity of the Port of New York and New Jersey via Conrail's Lehigh Line to the Susquehanna River valley at the south end of the Wyoming Valley Coal Region. Administratively, it is part of Norfolk Southern's Keystone Division and is part of the Crescent Corridor. As of 2021 the line is freight-only, although there are perennial proposals to restore passenger service over all or part of the line.
The Cleveland Line is a railroad line owned and operated by Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), in the U.S. states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. The line runs from Rochester, Pennsylvania, to Cleveland, Ohio, along a former Pennsylvania Railroad line.