After the transcontinental railroad was completed, passengers could travel from New York to San Francisco in eight days.
The First Transcontinental Railroad known originally as the "Pacific Railroad" was a 1,912-mile continuous railroad line constructed between 1863 and 1869 that connected the existing eastern U.S. rail network at Omaha, Nebraska/Council Bluffs, Iowa with the Pacific coast at the Oakland Long Wharf on San Francisco Bay.