The Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway, established in 1833 and sometimes referred to as the Lake Shore, was a major part of the New York Central Railroad's Water Level Route from Buffalo, New York, to Chicago, Illinois, primarily along the south shore of Lake Erie and across northern Indiana. The line's trackage remains a major rail transportation corridor used by Amtrak passenger trains and several freight lines; in 1998, its ownership was split at Cleveland between CSX Transportation to the east and Norfolk Southern Railway in the west.
Conrail Shared Assets Operations (CSAO) is the commonly used name for modern-day Conrail, an American railroad company. It operates three networks, the North Jersey, South Jersey/Philadelphia, and Detroit Shared Assets Areas, where it serves as a contract local carrier and switching company for its owners, CSX Transportation and the Norfolk Southern Railway. When most of the former Conrail's track was split between these two railroads, the three shared assets areas were kept separate to avoid giving one railroad an advantage in those areas. The company operates using its own employees and infrastructure but owns no equipment outside MOW equipment.
Michigan Services are three Amtrak passenger rail routes connecting Chicago, Illinois with the Michigan cities of Grand Rapids, Port Huron, and Detroit, and stations en route. The group is a component of the Midwest Regional Rail Initiative.
The Michigan Central Railroad was originally incorporated in 1846 to establish rail service between Detroit, Michigan, and St. Joseph, Michigan. The railroad later operated in the states of Michigan, Indiana, and Illinois in the United States and the province of Ontario in Canada. After about 1867 the railroad was controlled by the New York Central Railroad, which later became part of Penn Central and then Conrail. After the 1998 Conrail breakup, Norfolk Southern Railway now owns much of the former Michigan Central trackage.
The Kankakee, Beaverville and Southern Railroad Company is a Class III railroad serving agricultural communities in east-central Illinois and west-central Indiana.
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.
Cleveland has been and continues to be deeply rooted in railroad history.
The Trenton Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in the U.S. states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The line runs from CP PARK in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, northeast to Port Reading Junction in Manville, New Jersey, along a former Reading Company line.
The Harrisburg Line is a rail line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS) in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The line runs from Philadelphia west to Harrisburg.
The New Castle District is a railroad line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway in the U.S. states of Ohio and Indiana. The line runs from Evendale northwest and north to Fort Wayne, Indiana along former Pennsylvania Railroad and New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad lines. Its south end is at Evendale, where it meets the Dayton District and Indiana and Ohio Railway's Oasis Subdivision. It runs along a piece of CSX Transportation's Toledo Subdivision from Hamilton north to New Miami, Ohio using trackage rights. The New Castle District junctions the Frankfort District at Muncie, Indiana. In Fort Wayne, it crosses the Huntington District and ends at the Chicago District.
The Lincoln Secondary is a railroad line owned and operated by Conrail in the U.S. state of Michigan as part of its Conrail Shared Assets Operations.
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 Pittsburgh to St. Louis Main Line was a rail line owned and operated by the Pennsylvania Railroad in the U.S. states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The line ran from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania west via Steubenville, Ohio, Columbus, Ohio, Dayton, Ohio, Indianapolis, Indiana, Terre Haute, Indiana, and Vandalia, Illinois to East St. Louis, Illinois. In addition to its east end in downtown Pittsburgh, where it met the Main Line and Pittsburgh to Chicago Main Line, junctions included the Columbus to Chicago Main Line at Columbus, the C&X Branch at Xenia, the Columbus to Indianapolis Main Line via Bradford at New Paris, the Richmond Branch and Fort Wayne Branch at Richmond, the Louisville Branch and I&F Branch at Indianapolis, and the Peoria Branch at Farrington, Illinois.
The Indiana Northeastern Railroad is a Class III short line freight railroad operating on nearly 130 miles (210 km) in southern lower Michigan, northeast Indiana and northwest Ohio. The Indiana Northeastern Railroad Company began operations in December 1992 and is an independent privately owned company. As of 2017 the railroad hauled more than 7,000 carloads per year. Commodities moved by the railroad include corn, soybeans, wheat and flour. It also handles plastics, fiberboard, aluminum, copper, coal, perlite, stone, lumber, glass, rendering products, as well as agricultural fertilizers and chemicals.
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 Baltimore and Ohio and Chicago Railroad (B&O&C) was a subsidiary of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) that owned the line from Willard, Ohio to Chicago, Illinois.
Columbus and Ohio River Railroad is a railroad in the U.S. state of Ohio owned by Genesee & Wyoming Inc.
The Saginaw Subdivision is a railroad line in the U.S. state of Michigan. The line runs 105 miles from Toledo, Ohio, to Saginaw, Michigan. CSX owns the line although since 2006, the section from Mt. Morris to Saginaw has been leased to the Lake State Railway but is still occasionally used by CSX. The Plymouth to Mt. Morris line was also leased to LSRC starting in March 2019.
The Vandalia Railroad Company was incorporated January 1, 1905, by a merger of several lines in Indiana and Illinois that formed a 471-mile railroad consisting of lines mostly west of Indianapolis.
