History.com, people boarding a train on the Transcontinental Railroad

The Transcontinental Railroad changed and improved transportation (Twain). “The railroad, which stretched nearly 2,000 miles between Iowa, Nebraska and California, reduced travel time across the West from about six months by wagon or 25 days by stagecoach to just four days” (History.com). The Transcontinental Railroad took place from 1863 to 1869 (Twain). The Transcontinental Railroad was revolutionary because it changed how items are transported and how people travel. The reaction to the Transcontinental Railroad was that it caused people to gain interest in the west (“The Transcontinental Railroad”).