9781422277102

Not everything turned out as planned at first. Certain unforeseen vulnerabilities threatened the trucking industry just as the first Interstate pieces were coming together to create a fast transnational route. The first was instability in the price of gasoline. That caused fuel costs to go up and trucking companies had to pay those costs and charge more for their services. The result was that manufacturers and retailers had to pay a lot more money to ship their goods, so trains were once again looking to be the better option. To solve this problem, one of history’s oldest automotive technologies came roaring back into fashion in the 1970s and made trucking into the coast-to-coast shipping industry it is today. Until the early 1970s, when the Interstate Highway System was nearly complete, trucking was mostly a regional

To compete with diesel-powered trains in terms of fuel costs, truck makers put diesel engines in trucks.

industry. The new Interstates offered wide lanes, smooth pavement, and gentle curves. The problem was that most trucks ran using gasoline engines. Two major gas shortages hit the United States in the 1970s, more than doubling prices over the course of the decade. This meant trains continued to be around the same cost or cheaper than trucks even with the Interstate system. Don’t trains need fuel too? Yes, but their fuel is different and cheaper. Trains run on diesel engines , which are more efficient. This means that a tank of diesel creates more energy, in this case by creating more compression, than

The advent of the Interstate Highway System made coast-to-coast truck transportation a possibility.

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