Pacific Railroad Essay Outline

In 1866, the Rocky Mountain News reported that, "the one moral, the one remedy for every evil, social, political, financial, and industrial, the one immediate vital need of the entire Republic, is the Pacific Railroad” (Rocky Mountain News, 1866). The Transcontinental Railroad is often recognized for solving all the inconveniences that the United States had such as slow and inefficient trade, slow transportation, and limited communication. When it was completed on May 10, 1869, it had immediate effects on America and marked the beginning of a new transportation era. For instance, in the 1800s, it took half a day by stage coach to travel from New York to Boston. However, it took a train one fourth of a day to travel from New York to Boston,

However, this also caused many problems, including many diseases such as cholera and yellow fever in addition to the harsh weather conditions, leading to thirst and famine. Americans needed a safer and more efficient way to travel across the continent. In 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railroad Bill, which offered financial support to for the Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroad companies to construct a railroad which linked the United States from the East Coast to the West Coast. Specifically, the Central Pacific railroad company would start building eastward from Sacramento, while the Union Pacific railroad company would start building westward from the Missouri River, to ensure that the two companies would work as efficiently as possible. After the Transcontinental Railroad was completed, there was an immediate improvement in trade and shipping. Within ten years, the railroad had shipped $50 million worth of freight across the continent each year (pbs.org). Overall, the Transcontinental Railroad provided more opportunity with a safer and more convenient way of traveling across the United

In the first chapter, he had described all the transportation problems Americans had encountered. Some of the problems he had observed were lack of roads, slow stagecoaches, and very few sailboats. For example, many of the roads were blocked by rivers, streams or even trees and wagons often got stuck in mud. In addition, crowded stage coaches were often not comfortable to ride in. It also took a long time to travel from one place to another. In 1800, more than two-thirds of the American people lived on the east coast and had no contact with anyone in the West. However, the development of transportation routes over land led to a huge population boom in the West. By 1845, more than half of the United States population were living in the West (washingtonpost.com). The introduction of railroads essentially solved all the transportation problems that the United States had by connecting the east coast to the west