Consolidated Rail Corporation Conrail was created in 1976 to solve the railroad mess in the Northeast United States. The plan was unveiled on July 26, 1975, consisting of lines from Penn Central and six other companies—the Ann Arbor Railroad (bankrupt 1973), Erie Lackawanna Railway (1972), Lehigh Valley Railroad (1970), Reading Company (1971), Central Railroad of New Jersey (1967) and Lehigh and Hudson River Railway (1972). Controlled railroads and jointly-owned railroads such as Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines and the Raritan River Railroad (1980) were also included Conrail was later split (after the mess was cleaned up) and sold to Norfolk Southern and CSX in 1999. From Wikipedia