can be completed in six years from the time it is put into the hands of a competent contractor. As these shafts will be the deepest on the line of tunnel, (the portion between them lies under the summits of Kate Mountain,) I will not venture to predict what character of rock will be encountered. If it should be slate or shaly sandstone, much more rapid progress can be made. If compact sandstone or limestone, even then the rate of 100 feet per month ought to be attained. Much water will probably be met with, and will require the use of the most improved pumping machinery. The great quantity of material to be removed-about one ton in every four minutes-will be facilitated by the large area of tunnel, but will require skillful management, and the best mechanical helps. CHESAPEAKE AND OHIO RAILROAD. From the mouth of Howard's Creek to the mouth of Scary, about sixteen miles below Charleston, the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad follows the valleys of the Greenbrier, New, and Kanawha Rivers. The location made for the Covington and Ohio road, of which this is the successor, took into view the construction of the water-line, and was placed at an elevation above the reach of floods as increased by the dams to be erected, and high enough to permit the passage of boats beneath its bridges. The location by the present company, however, is but a few feet above the maximum freshet-height of the river in its unimproved condition, and will be flooded in high water if this project is carried out. But little work, however, has yet been done on it which would not be available for a location high enough to be out of the way of the water-line; but it is understood that the entire road will be placed under contract in the spring, and it becomes, therefore, of great importance that the question of the construction of the water-line be determined at an early day, and an arrangement entered into with the railroad company for the necessary changes in its location. Negotiations have been opened, and propositions made, by the James River and Kanawha Company, with a view to arrange the terms upon which the alterations would be made by the railroad, but so far, I am advised, without definite results. MODE OF TRANSPORTATION. Through-freights will be transported by barges, towed by steam, from the mouth of the Kanawha to Greenbrier Bridge, and thence by canalboats to Richmond, moved, I would say, by horse-power, were I not satisfied that steam will be introduced as the motor on large canals before this work can be constructed. For some classes of freights it may be more economical to use barges small enough to go through on the canal, two of which can pass the river-locks at once, and thus avoid the necessity of breaking bulk. But I apprehend that for grain, which will probably form the greater part of the freight, the larger barges will be used, and the cargoes transferred at Greenbrier Bridge. With proper elevators the cost of transfer need not exceed 1 cent per bushel. In the present uncertain and embarrassed condition of the Ohio and Kanawha navigation, heavy freights are carried for about 1.8 mills per ton per mile. It is not, then, too much to assume that by a systematic organization, and the use of larger boats, the cost may be reduced to 14 mills. We will, however, put it at 2 mills. I estimate the cost on the Greenbrier and New Rivers at 3 mills per ton per mile, and on the canal at 3.6 mills, making an average of about 3.16 mills per ton per mile, or $1 523 for the whole distance from the Ohio to Richmond. The entire cost of the improvement will be about........ Six per cent. on which is... Total... $48, 000, 000 2,880,000 387, 200 3,267, 200 With a trade of 5,000,000 tons per annum a charge of 65.3 cents per ton on the through-route will pay these expenses, at the rate of 1.34 mills per ton per mile, making total cost, with tolls, but without profits to carriers, 4.5 mills per ton per mile. The average charges, for ten years, from Chicago to New York, have been, by the water-lines, $7 662 per ton, and by Central Railroad, $14 31. From St. Louis, flour has been carried to New York, by rail, for $13 per ton, and by way of New Orleans for $11 50. The actual cost of transportation per ton per mile by the Virginia water-line would be as follows: From St. Louis to mouth of Kanawha, 903 miles, 0.3 cent.. Cost from St. Louis to New York, without tolls on canal or profits $2.71 152 25 40 4 88 From Dubuque, Iowa, one of the points on the Mississippi nearest to Chicago, to New York, by rail, is 1,145 miles. One ton of freight moved over this distance, at 0.12 cent per mile, would cost $13 74. From Dubuque to New York, by rail to Chicago, and thence by the northern water-lines, cost as follows: Dubuque to Chicago, by rail, 188 miles, at 0.12 cent.. cent.. Three transhipments.. $2 25.6 2 08.4 140 50 Total... 6 62 From Dubuque to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water-line, will cost: Dubuque to mouth of Kanawha, by river, 1,367 miles, at 0.3 cent. $4 10 Mouth of Kanawha to Richmond, 480 miles, at 0.316 cent...... Richmond to Hampton Roads, 100 miles, at 0.25 cent. Two transshipments. Total 1 52 25 40 6 27 Showing a difference from Dubuque of 29 cents per ton by the Virginia water-lines over that by the lakes, although the difference of dis tance against it is two hundred and forty-one miles. Of all points on the Mississippi, Dubuque is one of the most favorable to the northern lakes in this comparison. The Virginia route is open several months during which the northern lines are closed by ice, and is free from the dangers which affect that navigation during the busiest months of the grain movement. In addition to through-freights from the West to the seaboard, the trade of the Virginia line will be increased by local developments. The coal deposits of the Kauawha have been worked with marked success, though to a comparatively limited extent. Bituminous cannel and splint coals are found in abundance, and are mined with very little. cost. The iron ores of East Virginia, lying near the line of the canal, cover large tracts of country. They are of excellent quality, and will be extensively developed by cheap coal from the Kanawha. Three-fourths of the salt-works formerly so productive are now, I am informed, "dead-rented"* to proprietors of other works on the Ohio, to prevent their competition. They are capable of any required development. The general argument for the construction of this work is to be found in the necessity for more lines of transportation, and for cheaper rates from the northwest to the Atlantic, as set forth in the memorials to Congress of the States of Virginia and Iowa. Time has not permitted me to present from original sources such statistics of western production and transportation as would have been desirable. The surplus products of the Northwest exceed twenty-five millions tons, of which from five to six millions come to the Atlantic States over our four trunk lines of railway and the Erie Canal. The total wheat and corn crop of 1868 was nearly 1,000,000,000 bushels; of which there were received at the lake ports, 84,000,000 bushels; shipped to New York by water, 53,000,000; by rail, 14,000,000; and exported 30,000,000 bushels. In 1869 the receipts at lake ports were 113,000,000 bushels; at New York, 62,000,000 bushels; and the exports for the year ending June 30, 1869, 35,000,000 bushels. Under the stimulus of high prices for farm products since the war large quantities of grain have been sent forward at rates for transportation which they cannot hereafter pay. During the season of 1870 the reduction of tolls and freights on the Erie Canal made up, to some extent, for the fall in prices, and considerable quantities were sent, by way of the St. Lawrence, through Canada. The growth of the West constantly keeps ahead of the progress of the railroads, and the result is, the transportation companies absolutely control the rate of freight. The present railroad lines having as much freight as they can carry, there is no motive for competition between them, but rather for collusion to secure the highest possible rates. So heavy are the transportation taxes now laid on this trade (that of the Ohio and the Northwest) that, at the present time, (April, 1870,) breadstuffs and produce to the value of hundreds of millions is perishing in the West, for the reason that it would cost more to move it to the seaboard than it would bring when it reached there. This fact and the consequent discouragement of production is a cause of serious alarm, when we consider that it is on a western produce that we must, in a great measure, depend to make up the balance of our foreign trade. Without cheaper transportation, however, we cannot compete with Russia and other grain-producing countries in foreign markets; but with free navigation from the Mississippi, via the Wisconsin and Fox Rivers, the lakes, and the Erie Canal, to the seaboard at this point, the agricultural resources of the country would be more fully and properly developed, the volume of our export trade largely increased, and prosperity of our State permanently assured.-Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, April, 1870. * Paid to remain idle. But I apprehend that this portion of the argument will be admitted by all: 1. That the depression of business is greatly affected by the high cost of food. 2. That cheaper transportation will give cheaper food at the East. 3. That western agriculture will be stimulated to increased produc tion. 4. That the quantity and value of our exports will also be increased. To those who have investigated the subject the great economy of water transportation is well known, and it is generally conceded by the mercantile community. We have but one canal connecting the western waters with the Atlantic-the Erie. Of its importance, notwithstanding the rapid growth of the railroad system of the State, as a source of wealth and an element of commercial prosperity, we can best judge from the tonnage statistics of the State engineer's report, which show that, during the seven months of navigation in 1869, the canals moved more freight than were carried by all the railroads of the State during the year. The Erie Canal proper has cost in construction, improvement, repairs, and management, with interest on all expenditures, $140,430,953, and has paid in tolls, with interest on all sums received, $181,828,603, or a net profit, over principal and interest, of $41,397,650. Notwithstanding the high rate of tolls which produced this enormous profit, the charges for transportation by canal have generally been about half as much as by rail. Although at times the railroad rates have been reduced to the same as the canal, they have then been less than cost, and required the imposition of excessive charges on local trade to make up the loss. For the year 1867, canal charges, on the round trip from Buffalo to Albany, were averaged at 1 cent per ton per mile, 44 per cent. of which was toll. The average receipts per ton per mile during the years 1865, 1866, and 1867 were, on New York State canals, 1 cent; New York Central Railroad, 2.92 cents; Erie Railroad, 2.42 cents. The policy of low tolls on her canals has been inaugurated by the State of New York with the view to retain and increase the immense trade brought by them to her emporium. The profits of transporting, handling, selling, and shipping will advance her prosperity far more than the receipts for tolls. Another enlargement of the Erie Canal is urged, at a cost of $10,000,000, for the purpose of reducing cost of transportation from 2.16 to 1.7 mills per ton per mile. The Pennsylvania canals, so long a burden and expense to that State, though of small dimensions and unfitted for the most economical transportation, having passed into the hands of the Pennsylvania Central Railroad Company, under the skillful management which has accomplished such great results for the railway, are being brought into condition to facilitate and cheapen transportation on their lines. Hon. William I. McAlpine, one of our most eminent engineers, in an address delivered by him in 1868, states the case with so much force and with such authority that I introduce here his remarks: The Erie Canal now conveys one-fourth of the whole of the exports of that vast interior region which I have already described, and as much of it during its six months of uninterrupted navigation as all of the trunk railways together during the same term. Every canal-boat which comes to this city with an average cargo is more than the average of the New York Central Railroad trains. In the busy canal season, more than one hundred and fifty such boats come daily to tide-water, and the New York Central Railroad traffic never reaches thirty trains per day. Such a canal traffic would make more than twenty miles of railroad cars, and there is neither room nor convenience for discharging one-fourth of that number. The slow plodding canal-boat attracts no attention, while the bustle, noise, and whirl of a freight train creates a sensation in every village through which it passes. The locks on the canals act as regulators of the boats, which are separated just the distance which they would move during one lockage, and hence the canal business proceeds methodically, and gives no idea of its great volume. Nor is this appreciated until some stoppage occurs, and then a delay of twenty-four hours will accumulate hundreds of boats, enough to fill the Central track-half way from here to Utica. One of the commissioners told me to-day that a break at Schenectady, which required six days to repair, filled the canal to Utica on one side, and to the Hudson on the other. Mr. Drullard told me last fall that the freight which has frozen up on the canal would, (with their other business,) occupy all the power of the Central six mouths to transport it to the Hudson. Six days more of canal navigation would have brought every pound of this freight to tide-water. Imagine, if you can, what would be the effect of a catastrophe that should stop the navigation of the canals for one season. All of the New York roads could not transport one tenth, and all of the roads to the seaboard put together, not one-fifth of it. Half the merchants of New York connected directly or indirectly with this canal traffic would be bankrupted, and their rivals in Portland, Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, would be correspondingly profited. It is evident that all the channels of trade in operation between the Atlantic and the West, as now managed, are inadequate to accommodate or perform it at a cost which, in time of low prices, will allow the agricultural products of the West to be transported. In a broad view of the subject, there is no antagonism between the interests of the canals and railways of this State. They have each their appropriate functions to perform, and while accomplishing these, each of them is adding to the business of the other. A prominent cause for the transfer of much of the legitimate business of the canals to the railways (of our State arises from the fact that the former is under individual management, and the latter is controlled by politicians. As the manager of several western railways, where the direction and route of a large transport was controlled, I can safely say that I was never for a week without the presence of a solicitor of freights from one or more of the New York railways, and in ten years of such active management I never once had an applicant to direct our freights over the Erie Canal. All that took that direction (and it was no inconsiderable amount) was from the sheer force or influence of its own merit. The reports of the railroad companies do not furnish the means of determining the cost to them of transportation. The most favorable statements represent it to be 1.2 cent per ton. Coal in large quantities can be carried at less cost. It has been urged as against the project of a new water-line that railroads of easy grades and curves, and running at low rates of speed, could carry freights at almost nominal rates. Undoubtedly, by such means, with a track exclusively for slow freights, and perhaps by adopting, to some extent, the lessons of the narrow-guage railway, railroad transportation may be very much cheapened. Good authorities maintain, however, that a reduction of speed below eight to ten miles per hour is not economical, and the third track adds materially to the expense. But the first argument is the fact that none of our through lines have thought it worth while to inaugurate such a system, while they have plenty of freights at higher and better paying rates. Freights of certain classes belong legitimately to the railroad; they are of greater value and can afford to pay higher rates, and for such articles the great saving in time, by which a larger business can be done on the same capital, will always give it the preference. To these the water-line can lay no claim. Its specialty will be the transportation of such as would scarcely be borne by the railway in any case, such as are now "perishing in the West because it would cost more to move them to the seaboard than they would bring when they reached there." |