America Deserves a Transcontinental Option that Lowers Costs and Enhances Competition
Key Takeaways:
- A seamless transcontinental network expands freight options. The combination would create America’s first single-line coast-to-coast railroad with new lanes, faster routing and broader market access.
- Single-line service reduces supply chain friction. Fewer handoffs and more direct routing are designed to improve speed, reliability and efficiency for long-distance freight movement.
- The proposed combination strengthens American competitiveness.The applicationhighlights supply chain growth, new union jobs, and expanded rail capacity as long-term economic benefits.
The proposed Union Pacific–Norfolk Southern combination will create a seamless, coast to coast rail network that strengthens the U.S. supply chain, lowers shipping costs and helps American railroads compete more effectively in a freight market dominated by expensive, inefficient longhaul trucking.
It’s a big idea; but America isn’t afraid of big things. Even the interstate highway system and airline deregulation – which expanded competition and consumer choice – were contested at the start. Both proved foundational to the economic growth and coast-to-coast connectivity that have fueled American innovation and competitiveness in the last half century.
The amended application, filed April 30, directly responded to the Surface Transportation Board’s (STB) requests, meeting every requirement head-on. It makes previous merger details public, removes any possibility of TRRA control and presents market share data in a transparent, fullysupported case – leveraging 100% actual traffic data from all six North American Class I railroads, rather than sample data, for the first time in modern rail history.
Based on that record, the railroads look forward to the STB’s rigorous, factbased review on the combination’s merits, which will remove millions of trucks from the highway, protect and creategoodpaying union jobs, and save shippers and supply chains billions of dollars annually — benefits that flow through to American consumers and American workers.
Big ideas invite debate, but they also must be evaluated on the facts, and the facts are clear.
Stronger competition, grounded in real data
Every day, American railroads compete with longhaul trucking as well as with Canadian rail companies that dominate key crossborder lanes. The combination of Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern addresses longstanding structural limitations that have restricted rail’s ability to meet shipper needs and allows the industry to truly compete on speed, cost, reliability and reach.
The combination doesn’t just preserve competition — it expands access, including:
- Seven new premium intermodal lanes operating seven days a week, including a new Northern California-to-Southeast route.
- Nearly 88,000 new county to county singleline options.
The updated analysis makes clear those operational improvements a merged network would provide:
Just as importantly, the data also confirms what will not change: This merger will not reduce the number of Class I railroads from two to one in any market or corridor, meaning those shippers who have a choice today will continue to have competitive options after the merger.
When looking at competition, scale matters. Combined, Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern will represent less than 11% of total U.S. freight transportation, according to 2023 U.S. Department of Transportation data. This procompetitive transaction expands choice like never before.
Faster service, lower costs, more reliability
Today, interchange handoffs between western carriers, like Union Pacific, and eastern carriers, like Norfolk Southern, can add 24 to 48 hours to a shipment. Combined, singleline service removes those delays, helping deliver the faster, more predictable service American manufacturers and supply chains need while also helping shippers reduce inventory and equipment costs.
- About 2,550 fewer rail car and container handlings per day (up from earlier estimates).
- Roughly 65,000 fewer carmiles each day, improving efficiency and network fluidity.
Using actual traffic data, the analysis confirms a combined system delivers what customers care about most: faster, more reliable service at lower cost.
Driving growth, jobs, and affordability
The combination will make rail more competitive with highercost trucking, enabling a meaningful shift in freight movement that is expected to:
- Deliver $3.5 billion in annual savings for shippers, with the potential to help lower consumer prices.
- Support 1,200 net new highpaying union jobs by year three driven by increased demand and growth.
- Provide the strongest labor protections ever proposed, including an unprecedented Jobs for Life guarantee for all union employees who have a job at the time of the merger.
- Remove approximately 2.1 million trucks from the road, making roads safer and less congested.
These are real, measurable economic benefits that strengthen the broader U.S. economy as well as supply chains.
Meaningful environmental benefits
New analysis using more precise traffic data also shows stronger environmental gains.
- At full implementation, the merger is expected to eliminate nearly 3.8 million metric tons of CO2 emissions annually, driven by reduced fuel use as freight shifts from truck to rail.
This combination offers a meaningful step forward in improving the efficiency and sustainability of the supply chains Americans rely on for the goods they need.
Broad, on-the-record support
The application is supported by more than 2,000 stakeholders from across the country, including customers, community leaders, economic development leaders and labor organizations. That level of support reflects a shared understanding: this combination strengthens competition, improves service and delivers tangible benefits across the economy.
At its core, the Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern merger is straightforward. It creates a coasttocoast railroad that makes U.S. rail more competitive, lowers costs, improves service, protects and creates union jobs and strengthens the supply chain for the long term. That’s the case the amended presents — and it deserves to be evaluated on the facts as the regulatory process intends, not sidetracked by objectors seeking to stop the process for their own self-interests under the guise of a procedural objection.
The question is not whether the freight network will evolve — but whether the U.S. rail industry will lead that transformation.