A trend is developing in the USA towards merging railroads into one group. With all the recent mergers and buyouts lately we are down to only 3 or 4 mainline railroads. With the problems besetting some of these it's only a matter of time until all are merged into one. Well the Federal goverment will not allow this to happen, no sir, they will simply nationalize the rails in the nations interest.As with all Federal endeavors there will be a period of time when everything will be renamed to suit the goverments penchant for acronyms. Following is a short list of proposed acronyms for rail use:
Engines will be Mobile Unit Diesel or MUD
Track will be Fixed Unit Rail or FUR
Highway crossings will be Sites of Potential Accidents or SAP
Derailments will be Not On Track or NOT
Engineers will be Drivers of Large Locomotives or DOLLS
Fatalaties will be Dead As Doornail or DAD
The Railroad will be United States Goverment or USG, which will quickly be tagged by the pundits as "Unreliable, Slow and Goverment operated.Newspaper headlines concerning an accident where a truck strikes a train might read: USG DOLL reports MUD & FUR flew @ SAP, no DAD but NOT.
Further developments might lead to various Stated operating parts of the rail system under lease. This would cause the rolling stock and engines operated this way to be labeled State Leased Under Goverment or SLUG.
Pundits will be quick to rename as Slow Late Unreliable Goverment operated system. After a tremendous expense of painting all leased equipment, the Goverment will levy a new tax to fund the States repainting cost. The new equipment will be known as United Goverment Lease Yearly or UGLY.