GEOGRAPHY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA 283 



to Silver Springs. There is occasional freight traffic, perhaps less 

 now than formerly, still farther up the Ocklawaha to the large 

 lakes of central Lake County. The Kissimmee River together 

 with lakes and canals affords navigation all the way from Kissim- 

 mee to Lake Okeechobee, but as the river is very crooked and the 

 population near it very sparse, there has never been much traffic 

 on it. Much of the phosphate exported from the hard rock dis- 

 trict travels a few miles on the Withlacoochee River, from Inglis, 

 the terminus of a short railroad, to its mouth. The lagoons along 

 the east coast have been connected up by short canals, and the shal- 

 lower stretches deepened, so that boats drawing not more than 

 three or four feet have an "inside passage" the whole length of the 

 coast. 



RAILROADS 



Central Florida is well supplied with railroads, considering it? 

 sparse population, and it is one of the few parts of the United 

 States that has had any railroad building in the last five or six 

 years. In 1880 apparently the only railroads in this area were 

 lines connecting Cedar Keys and Ocala with Jacksonville, and an 

 isolated line from Astor on the St. John's River to Fort Mason on 

 Lake Eustis : about 83 miles in all. By 1891 the mileage had in- 

 creased more than ten- fold, to 1,026, or about one mile to ever}- 

 100 inhabitants. 



At the beginning of 1920 there were about 1,875 miles oi 

 track on which passenger service was operated, making about one 

 mile to every y.j square miles or every 160 inhabitants. None oi 

 the lines are double-tracked, and the average num'ber of passenger 

 trains is about two each way a day (four or five on some lines in 

 winter, though). Nearly half the present mileage belongs to the 

 Atlantic Coast Line and its subsidiaries, and next in order are the 

 Seaboard Air Line (including Tampa Northern, Tampa & Guli 

 Coast, etc.), with 28.6%, Florida East Coast. 15.2%, Tavares & 

 Gulf 2%, Ocklawaha Valley, Charlotte Harbor & Northern, and 

 Tampa & Jacksonville. 



The mileage of railroads for 1920 is shown by regions in Table 

 39, which gives also for each region the percentage of the total 

 area, population, and railroad mileage which it has, as nearly a? 

 can be estimated. 



