How did the California gold rush affect the transcontinental railroad?
The transcontinental railroad would not have become a reality if it were not for the California gold rush. Imagine for a minute or two that there were no Californian gold rush. With no gold rush, there is no gigantic rush to populate that region. If there aren’t enough people then there aren’t enough businesses and the economic network is tiny. There is no profit in building a railroad out to California now. Think of how a railroad expands in the first place. People settle into an area and a city forms up around them. The city gets too packed so the people move out into the frontiers. Slowly the frontiers get developed and become towns. Now small railroad networks are connected to these towns (but keep in mind that until this “frontier” became a “town” it was not profitable to build a railroad there but now that it IS a town it is profitable). The railroad only gets built there because now there is potential profit to be had (the money gained for transporting people and goods vs the mo
