After the Erie and Lackawanna merger, much of the traffic from the merged road's New York City area to the Southern Tier of New York State ran on the Delaware Division, the former Erie line.  The grades and curvature were lower on this line, and it may have been in better condition at the time.  However, as tight finances drove a deferred-maintenance pregramin the late 1960s and early 1970s, the track conditions deteriorated.  In fact, conditions deteriorated so far that starting in1973 the traffic was gradually moved to the Scranton Division, and the second track and signalling on the Delaware Division were removed.  These traffic moves are reflected in the Freight Schedules published in the employee timetable:  through trains running via Scranton increased from two in 1969 to eight in 1974 -- and that was just the published schedule.  In actual practice many more trains were run through Scranton in 1974.