Source: National Bureau of Economic Research  

Release: NBER Macrohistory Database  

Units:  Miles, Not Seasonally Adjusted

Frequency:  Annual

These Data Refer To Miles Of First Track Completed In A Calendar Year. It Is Not Clear At What Stage The Building Of A Mile Of Road Was Reported. If Construction Of A Line Took Several Years, A Company May Have Reported Each Year, Or Might Have Waited Until The Whole Line Was Completed. Sometimes The Year Of Completion Differed From The Year In Which Traffic Was First Carried; In Such Cases The Mileage May Have Been Assigned To Either Year. The Data For 1830-79 Are Originally From The Tenth Census Report, Vol.Iv,"Report On The Agencies Of Transportation In The United States. These Data Were Compiled By The Bureau Of The Census From Reports Of Railroads Known To Exist In 1880. They Are Limited To Mileage Still In Operation In The Census Year 1880. Railway Age Obtained Its Figures At Annual Intervals From Individual Railroads And From State Railroad Commissions. For Data On Gross Capital Expenditure, Including Road And Equipment, Beginning In 1870, See Melville J. Ulmer, "Capital In Transportation Communications, And Public Utilities: Its Formation And Financing," Princeton University Press For NBER, 1960, P.255 Ff. Railroad Investment Data For The Pre-Civil War Period, Beginning In 1828, Are Available In Albert Fishlow, "American Railroads And The Transformation Of The Ante-Bellum Economy", Harvard University Press, 1965. Source: 1830-1879:"Historical Statistics Of The United States, Colonial Times To 1957, " Bureau Of The Census, Series Q43. 1880-1952:"Railway Age, " Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corp., New York, January 1, 1938, And Later Annual Review Issues.

This NBER data series a02082a appears on the NBER website in Chapter 2 at http://www.nber.org/databases/macrohistory/contents/chapter02.html.

NBER Indicator: a02082a