Nostalgia & History > When did CR put the "Q" on the logo?

Came across this shot of a westbound mail train near the "Anderson" DED on the Pittsburgh Line west of Lewistown with a triple-Q lashup, but it had no date on it and couldn't remember the time myself. Believe it might be '92 or '93 (or later) but know it couldn't be before they put the "Q" on the logo, esp. since I have earlier shots of the lead unit from years before with the original logo. TIA for any replies. JG

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"Conrail Quality" lettering first appeared in 1991. The trailing units in the photo are SD60M's, and since Conrail's first examples of that model were built in December 1992, the photo is probably 1993 or later. 

US business went on a quality kick in the 90s.  The picked up on the program from Japan's succes in the US auto market.

Bob Wilcox
Charlottesville, VA
My Flickr Shots

The "quality" cult became fashionable in US businesses about 1990, emulating certain practices that had propelled Japanese firms into great profits in the 1970s and 1980s.  A great deal of nonsense resulted in the long run, as endless, timewasting meetings, processes, and methods of evaluation were imposed on workers and workflow.  Everything became "quality" oriented. 

Oddly, just as the movement took hold here, the Japanese economy entered a long period of stagnation.

The "Q" cult still has at least one vestige in American railroading today, in the form of CSX's Q-symboled freight trains.  But the business practices and navel contemplations mandated by the quality movement have long since entered history's landfill.

Art House
 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/10/20 08:49 by aehouse.

The interesting thing, was statistical process control was an American invention, ignored by many, but religiously embraced by many Japanese firms. In the 80's the domestic auto manufacturers embraced it and forced their suppliers to implement it. The economic stagnation was largely political. SPC is not exactly friendly to bureaucracy. It is also far from dead: The accompanied promotion and glitter is.
 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/10/20 12:46 by EL3600.

No more conrail.. <sniff>.
6558 was repainted after March of 1994, so sometime around then it would appear.
Nice shot.

Even the military went for the "Total Quality Management" line of BS.
Spent an entire weekend drill locked in a classroom with 19 other "students" getting my indoctrination.