Was the railroad system successful?

The railroad opened the way for the settlement of the West, provided new economic opportunities, stimulated the development of town and communities, and generally tied the country together.



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During the post-World War II boom many railroads were driven out of business due to competition from airlines and Interstate highways. The rise of the automobile led to the end of passenger train service on most railroads.

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Within ten years of its completion, the railroad shipped $50 million worth of freight coast to coast every year. Just as it opened the markets of the west coast and Asia to the east, it brought products of eastern industry to the growing populace beyond the Mississippi.

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Answer and Explanation: However, two industries benefited the most from the Transcontinental Railroad. Those were cotton and cattle. Railroads made it possible for cotton farmers in the east to ship their products to the western frontier quickly.

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By 1900, much of the nation's railroad system was in place. The railroad opened the way for the settlement of the West, provided new economic opportunities, stimulated the development of town and communities, and generally tied the country together.

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Railroads became a major industry, stimulating other heavy industries such as iron and steel production. These advances in travel and transport helped drive settlement in the western regions of North America and were integral to the nation's industrialization.

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By 1860 the South's railroad network was one of the most extensive in the world, and nearly all of it had been constructed with slave labor. Moreover, railroad companies became some of the largest slaveholders in the South.

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The completion of the first transcontinental railroad revolutionized travel, connecting areas of the Western United States with the East. Prior to its completion, traveling to the West Coast from the East required months of dangerous overland travel or an arduous trip by boat around the southern tip of South America.

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The railroad was completed by the sweat and muscle of exploited labor, it wiped out populations of buffalo, which had been essential to Indigenous communities, and it extended over land that had been unlawfully seized from tribal nations.

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Railroads Were at the Forefront of Political Corruption “Railroads need monopoly franchises and subsidies, and to get them, they are more than willing to bribe public officials,” White says. The Central Pacific Railroad, for example, spent $500,000 annually in thinly disguised bribes between 1875 and 1885.

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Transcontinental Railroad Facts
  • It was built to connect the United States' East and West Coasts. ...
  • Approximately 1,800 miles of track. ...
  • The transcontinental railroad cost roughly $100 million. ...
  • Workers came from a wide range of backgrounds and ethnicity. ...
  • President Abraham Lincoln signed the Pacific Railway Act.


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On November 18, 1883, the railroads moved forward with the adoption of four U.S. time zones, an idea that had been proposed 11 years earlier by Charles Dowd, a Yale-educated school principal. The time zones, Eastern, Central, Mountain and Pacific, are still in place today.

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Along the way, these men helped give birth to the African American professional classes. The transcontinental railroad line offered them new opportunities for employment, broader knowledge about the U.S. for their personal betterment and that of their community.

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They unified countries, created great fortunes, enabled the growth of new industries, and thoroughly revolutionized life in every place they ran. Yet the human tolls for some projects were ghastly, with deaths of native laborers running into the tens of thousands.

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RAIL SHIPPING PROS: Comparable speed to truck shipping. Ability to transport large volumes of freight at one time. Reliable transit times and schedules. Environmentally responsible and fuel efficient.

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The primary importance of the underground railroad was that it gave ample evidence of African American capabilities and gave expression to African American philosophy.

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