Commuters now move between Seattle and Tacoma on the brand-new Sounder double deck passenger cars with locomotives just as new and shiny as the California Zephyr was in 1936. There's nothing 19th century about either of these trains. Trains are cutting edge. New locomotives use natural gas as fuel. Other new locomotives use gravity to generate electricity.
Intermodal technology allows for rapid movement of cargo.
Railroads were cutting edge in the 1850s. And they're cutting edge in 2001. When the White Pass and Yukon Route was built in 1899, it was considered truly visionary. And it will be visionary when Alaska is finally connected with the rest of North America by rail a century or so later. Relative to other forms of transportation, railroads are inexpensive, durable, effective and easy to build.