Transportation: The Great Boxcar Shortage

The Interstate Commerce Commission, ordinarily a pretty lethargic outfit, loudly cried crisis a couple of weeks ago. There was such a severe shortage of plain railroad boxcars that the ICC felt it necessary to issue emergency orders in an attempt to get produce and products moving again.

In the Midwest, mountains of grain lay aging in elevators for lack of boxcars to move the stuff to market centers. In the Far West, the area hardest hit by the boxcar shortage, at least 15 lumber mills have had to shut down temporarily because their production was far outdistancing their ability to transport....