Boxcar
PRR #64657
40' Double Youngstown doors Express boxcar. During the heyday of passenger service, mail & express traffic was a viable part of the railroad business. These 40’ double door boxcars, equipped with high-speed trucks, represent prototype cars assigned to this service. They were painted to match 60’ arch roof passenger cars. Major building of new 40-foot boxcars stopped in the late 1960s as railroads transitioned to larger 50-foot and specialized cars. A 1968 Association of American Railroads (AAR) ruling required the removal or modification of roofwalks on interchange cars by 1978, prompting many lines to retire older equipment rather than upgrade it. The 1980s economic recession and fleet modernizations led to the rapid scrapping of remaining 40-foot boxcars by roughly 1981 to 1984, though a tiny fraction lingered longer for specialized contaminated loads or regional Canadian grain service.