feature story Railroads
La
ying Tracks
to the Future of
Transportation
L
egends of the American West
are inextricably linked with
the railroads: great, steaming
locomotives, endless miles of
track disappearing beyond the horizon,
train stations and conductors and sure
-- maybe even a cowboy or train robber
or two. Part of the ethos that is perhaps
a romanticized rendition of times well
past, railroads are today still an engine
of commerce. While they are not tasked
anymore with settling a wild west, they
are continuing to break into new frontiers
of trade, efficiency and innovation that
still finds them pioneering new worlds.
For Fort Worth-based BNSF Railway,
this is just another live-long day, working
on the railroad. For North Texas, it’s a
day of trade and prosperity that having a
local industry giant like this brings.
The Frisco added
to the BN
1980
BN and Santa Fe merge to create
Burlington Northern and Santa Fe
Railway, the largest rail network in
North America at the time
1995
Length of network:
32,500 miles
States in network: 28
Canadian provinces: 3
Employees: 46,000
Ports served: 40+
Intermodal facilities: 30
Average trains per day:
1,800
Locomotives: 7,000
Capital investment in 2014:
$5 billion
Signal locations: 13,200
Bridges: 13,000
Tunnels:
Grade crossings: 26,000
Packages shipped on time
during typical holiday season:
50 million
The company
rebrands itself
BNSF Railway
2005
89
BNSF is purchased by
Berkshire Hathaway for
$34 billion
2010
Winter/Spring 2015
www.ntc-dfw.org
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