What the author fails to mention is the devastating effect unionized labor had on the rail lines in the middle of the twentieth century. The Less than car load frieght was done away with because of the cost of unionized labor, passenger service was also done away with in large part because of the extra overhead of unionized labor. Rail today is not competitive for many forms of frieght, one major ltl truck casrrier pulled 20,000 pup's off of rail this year because of the unpredictable nature of rail shipping. Most LTL shipments are not extremekly time sennsitive but with inventory's trimmed and lead times cut to days rather than weeks it's not ppratical to have a two or three week transit time from shipper to cognsignee. So the picture is a little more complex than the author paints with his GAAP manuel and his excel spreadsheet.
True. Passenger rail was dying thanks to organized labor, but the coup de grace was applied in 1968 when the post office pulled the mail off the passenger trains and handed it to the airlines. The post office had in effect been subsidizing long distance passenger trains, and the loss of that last subsidy pushed passenger rail over the edge.
Most LTL shipments are not extremekly time sennsitive but with inventory's trimmed and lead times cut to days rather than weeks it's not ppratical to have a two or three week transit time from shipper to cognsignee.
And that is why the Canadian National has bitten the bullet and is becoming a regularly scheduled freight railroad and why the Norfolk Southern is now following suit.