CSX Transportation

CSX Transportation Building in Jacksonville, Florida

CSX Corporation was formed on November 1, 1980, as a merger between Chessie System and Seaboard Coast Line Industries.[4]

Original logo for the CSX Corporation, emphasizing the "multiplication symbol" X

The name came about during merger talks between Chessie System and SCL, commonly called "Chessie" and "Seaboard". The company chairmen said it was important for the new name to include neither of those names because it was a partnership. Employees were asked for suggestions, most of which consisted of combinations of the initials. At the same time a temporary shorthand name was needed for discussions with the Interstate Commerce Commission. "CSC" was chosen but belonged to a trucking company in Virginia. "CSM" (for "Chessie-Seaboard Merger") was also taken. The lawyers decided to use "CSX", and the name stuck. In the public announcement, it was said that "CSX is singularly appropriate. C can stand for Chessie, S for Seaboard, and X, which actually has no meaning." However, an August 9, 2016, article on the Railway Age website stated that " ... the 'X' was for 'Consolidated' ".[5] A fourth letter had to be added to CSX when used as a reporting mark because reporting marks that end in X means that the car is owned by a leasing company or private car owner.

The originator of SCL was the former Seaboard Air Line Railroad, which previously merged with the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in 1967 to form the Seaboard Coast Line. In later years, it merged with the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, as well as several smaller subsidiaries such as the Clinchfield Railroad, Atlanta & West Point Railroad, Monon Railroad and the Georgia Railroad. From the late 1970s onward, these railroads were known collectively as the Family Lines. In 1982, they were merged into a single railroad, the Seaboard System Railroad.[4]

The origin of the Chessie System was the former Chesapeake & Ohio Railway, which had merged with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and the Western Maryland Railway.[4]

Despite the merger in 1980, CSX was a paper railroad (meaning no CSX painted locomotives or rolling stock) until 1986. In that year, Seaboard System changed its name to CSX Transportation. On April 30, 1987, the B&O merged into the C&O. With the Western Maryland having already merged into the C&O, this left the C&O as the sole operating railroad under the Chessie System banner. Finally, on August 31, 1987, C&O/Chessie System merged into CSX Transportation, bringing all of the major CSX railroads under one banner.

On June 23, 1997, CSX and Norfolk Southern Railway (NS) filed a joint application with the Surface Transportation Board for authority to purchase, divide, and operate the assets of the 11,000-mile (18,000 km) Conrail, which had been created in 1976 by bringing together several ailing Northeastern railway systems into a government-owned corporation. On June 6, 1998, the STB approved the CSX–NS application and set August 22, 1998, as the effective date of its decision. CSX acquired 42 percent of Conrail's assets, and NS received the remaining 58 percent. As a result of the transaction, CSX's rail operations grew to include some 3,800 miles (6,100 km) of the Conrail system (predominantly lines that had belonged to the former New York Central Railroad). CSX began operating its trains on its portion of the Conrail network on June 1, 1999. CSX now serves much of the Eastern United States, with a few routes into nearby Canadian cities.

In actuality, not all of Conrail was eliminated. There were a few parts of Conrail that both CSX and NS wanted, and neither wanted to allow the other to have total control over. Those small pieces remained owned by the renamed "Conrail Shared Assets," (later "Conrail Shared Assets Operations") so that the pieces were effectively owned and operated by a separate railroad owned by both railroads, thus neither railroad would control those pieces.

The company introduced its current slogan, "How Tomorrow Moves", in 2008.[6]

In 2014, Canadian Pacific Railway approached CSX with an offer to merge the two companies, but CSX declined, and in 2015 Canadian Pacific made an attempt to purchase and merge with Norfolk Southern,[7] but NS declined to do so as well.

In 2017, CSX announced Hunter Harrison would become its new chief executive officer; a settlement with activist investor Paul Hilal and Mantle Ridge.[8] CSX added five new directors to their board, including Harrison and Mantle Ridge founder Paul Hilal. Mantle Ridge owns 4.9% of CSX.[9] Harrison quickly moved to convert CSX rail operations to precision railroading.[10] On December 14, 2017, CSX announced that Hunter Harrison was on medical leave. Two days after the announcement, Harrison died, one day after being hospitalized for complications of an ongoing illness. CSX initially saw a 10% drop in its stock price, but turned around to hit a new 52-week high less than a month later (January 2018).[11] Harrison's successors have continued the shift to precision railroading, with most hump yards converted to flat yards, low volume shipping lanes eliminated and reductions in rolling stock and work force.

On November 30, 2020, CSX Transportation's parent company CSX Corporation announced on social media that they had come to an agreement with Pan Am Systems to purchase New England based Class II Pan Am Railways, pending regulatory approval from the Surface Transportation Board. The STB approved the purchase on April 14, 2022.[12] As part of the acquisition, Norfolk Southern Railway will gain trackage rights over several CSX lines, and Pan Am Southern, 50 percent owned by Pan Am Railways, will be operated by the Berkshire and Eastern Railroad, a new Genesee & Wyoming subsidiary formed explicitly for this purpose.[12] CSX completed the purchase on June 1, 2022.[13]

On June 28, 2023, CSX and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) announced the intention to purchase Meridian and Bigbee Railroad (MNBR). The MNBR creates a connection 168 miles (270 km) between CSX in Montgomery, Alabama and Meridian, Mississippi, where it joins the Meridian Speedway heading west. Under the proposed agreement, CSX would take over the section of the line between Montgomery and Myrtlewood, Alabama, while CPKC would do the same between Myrtlewood and Meridian. If the STB approves the purchase, it will provide a connection between the two companies' networks and allow CSX traffic destined for Mexico to be delivered directly to CPKC, eliminating the need for an third intermediate railroad to move such traffic. Currently, CSX traffic bound for Mexico is exchanged with the Union Pacific Railroad in New Orleans, who then takes it to the cross-border gateway in Laredo, Texas, where it is delivered to CPKC.[14][15]

In May 2023, CSX unveiled their first heritage unit locomotive No. 1827, which was painted in the Baltimore and Ohio homage livery.[27] In June, two more heritage units Nos. 1973 and 1982 were unveiled in the homage Chessie System and Seaboard System liveries, respectively.[28][29] On July 20, CSX unveiled No. 1976 in the Conrail homage livery.[30][31] On August 10, the fifth heritage unit locomotive No. 1869 was unveiled in the Chesapeake and Ohio homage livery.[32] On August 25, CSX unveiled their sixth heritage unit locomotive No. 1850 in the commemorative Louisville and Nashville livery.[33]

• 1986 Miamisburg train derailment near Miamisburg, Ohio
• 1993 Big Bayou Canot rail accident, near Mobile, Alabama
• 1996 Maryland train collision, in Silver Spring, Maryland
• 1997 West Virginia train collision; one killed[36]
• 2000 Tennga, Georgia bus–train collision; 3 killed, 4 injured
• 2001 CSX 8888 incident, in northwest Ohio, 1 minor injury. This was the inspiration for the 2010 action film Unstoppable
• 2001 Howard Street Tunnel fire, in Baltimore, Maryland
• 2007 Brooks derailment, in Brooks, Kentucky
• 2011 Mineral Springs, North Carolina, train wreck-fire involving 2 (Union Pacific) units and its train of fuel tankers at the back, 2 killed[37]
• 2012 Ellicott City, Maryland, train derailment, two killed
• 2013 Spuyten Duyvil derailment
• 2014 Midnight Rider train incident[38][39]
• 2015 Mount Carbon train derailment, Mount Carbon, West Virginia
• 2015 Tennessee train derailment, Maryville, Tennessee
• 2017 Biloxi, Mississippi collision with tour bus stuck on tracks; 4 killed, 44 injured[40]
• 2017 Pittsburgh suburb coal cars derailment[41]
• 2017 Hyndman, Pennsylvania derailment, chemical release and fire[42]
• 2017 Atlanta derailment destroys occupied home[43]
• 2018 Cayce, South Carolina, train collision involving Amtrak Silver Star and a CSX autorack train (Q210-03). 2 dead, 116 injured.
• 2018 Worcester, Massachusetts, derailment – On July 21, 2018, a CSX Intermodal train from Worcester, Massachusetts, hits a low overpass, causing 12 cars to derail. One car nearly crashed into a car full of toxic chemicals, engineer injured.[44]
• 2021 Barnsley, Kentucky, tornado – On December 10, 2021, a tornado struck and derailed a CSX train, throwing several cars uphill, including one that landed on a house.[45]
• 2023 Rockland County, New York, wildfire - On April 14 and 15, 2023, a multitude of wildfires broke out in suburban Rockland County, New York. Several firefighters suffered heat exhaustion battling the flames, and the fires inflicted some damage on property and structures. An investigation into these incidents is underway, with local officials claiming that a CSX train passing through several towns lit sparks, which then ignited on an unseasonably dry day with record-high temperatures upwards of 90 °F.[46]

In hump yards, trains are slowly pushed over a small hill as cars are uncoupled at the crest of the hill and allowed to roll down the hump into the appropriate tracks for outbound trains.

• Avon, Indiana – Avon Yard
• Cincinnati, Ohio – Queensgate Yard
• Nashville, Tennessee – Radnor Yard
• Selkirk, New York – Selkirk Yard
• Waycross, Georgia – Rice Yard