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The Trend of Car Construction 



H^UiDwoOD Eecord has made every eilort on various occasions 

 to set forth the lumbermen 's side of the question involving the 

 replacement of wooden passenger, mail and express cars with steel 

 cars of that character. "While it has been recognized that the 

 old type of all-wooden car is not adapted to the modern methods 

 of passenger transportation, it set forth in lucid and convincing 

 arguments, which arguments have all been accompanied by fitting 

 illustrations, proof that the modernly constructed car of the steel 

 under-frame and wooden super-structure type offers the greatest 

 advantages, including safety and comfort to the traveling public. 



Briefly summarizing these arguments it has been suggested that 

 in order to make a car of all-steel construction strong enough to 

 withstand the shock resulting from the average collision, it would 

 be necessary to have such a ponderous and clumsy affair as to make 

 it impossible of construction with any economy of transportation. 

 It has been proven that the type of all-steel car as now constructed 

 will not stand the shock resulting from such wrecks, and that 

 following a wreck of a serious nature, the injured or imprisoned 

 passenger is in a much more precarious situation than if he were 

 imprisoned in a wooden coach. The reason for this is that a 

 passenger wedged in a steel car has absolutely no chance of escape, 

 because, in the first place, all windows are immediately wedged 

 so that it is impossible to open them, and in the second place it 

 is impossible to cut through either from the inside or the outside 

 the steel plates which form the sides and roof of the so-called 

 modernly constructed steel passenger coach. 



Formerly there was seen in the wooden ears a glass-covered 

 case containing an axe, a saw and a bucket, which indicated 

 that the passenger had an opportunity of cutting his way out of 

 a dangerous wreck. The fact that these implements are omitted 

 from the all-steel car of present construction is an admission that 

 the entombed passenger has absolutely no chance of escape, and 

 therefore there is no use of making the effort. 



Beprints of these articles and the articles as appearing in Hard- 

 wood Record itself have been given wide publicity throughout the 

 country, and have been commented on by the leading officials of 

 most of the large railroad systems in the United States. Almost 

 without exception the opinions of these officials has been that the 

 all-steel car did not offer advantages over the car with the steel 

 under-frame and wooden super-structure, but that, on the other 

 hand, they favored the latter structure, but were forced mainly 

 by public opinion to adopt the all-steel car. 



Hardwood Eecord, as stated, has made every effort to combat 

 the growing demand for all-steel passenger car construction, and 

 still stands ready to exert itself to the utmost to still further 

 advocate the modern!}' constructed car with the wooden super- 

 structure over a steel under-frame. In spite of all eft"orts, how 

 ever, which have been made through this medium and other 

 sources, the steel car with the sides and roof of steel sheeting 

 has made great inroads on the former type with the steel under- 

 frame and wooden super-structure. In fact, the issue has now 

 become a political one. The interests fathering the effort to 

 secure the us3 of steel throughout in car construction have suc- 

 ceeded in stirring up sufficient interest in Washington to result 

 in the introduction of various bills, which, if passed, would abso- 

 lutely eliminate wood from ear construction. 



As stated, the railroads themselves have gone on record, through 

 their letters to Hardwood Record, to the effect that they did not 

 desire the all-steel constructed car, and they have gone on record 

 in other ways as opposed to its adoption throughout the country. 

 They have urged emphaticaly, says the American Railway Associa- 

 tion, an organization representing them in legal and statistical 

 matters, that that association Jo its utmost to prevent the passage 

 of the pending bills in Congress which would make it necessary 

 to change over the entire passenger equipment of all the railroads 

 throughout the country, and yet in the face of this we have the 

 spectacle of the railroads yielding to the importunities of their 



advertising departments to the extent of going headlong into the 

 construction of all-steel cars, merely, as far as any evidence 

 shows, because they find it necessary to advertise all-steel car 

 equipment in order to catch the traveler's eye. 



It would seem that the best method in the beginning, and a 

 method which would have saved the railroads millions of dollars 

 in more expensive and additional equipment, and millions of 

 dollars in extra cost of hauling the heavy steel construction, not 

 considering the additional wear on the roadbed and damages 

 resulting from the increased number of wrecks, would have been 

 to have organized a comprehensive campaign of education for the 

 purpose of convincing the public that the all-steel car was more 

 or less in the nature of a fad, and that it really did not offer any 

 advantages over the modernly constructed wooden super-structure 

 with steel under-frame, and that the latter type was by far the 

 preferable of the two. However, the railroads preferred to 

 adopt the other policy and in the face of their desire to abate the 

 legislation compelling the adoption of the all-steel cars have gone 

 ahead advertising it, therefore making it almost impossible to 

 successfully cambat the bills now pending. 



The American Railway Association, in connection with its 

 efforts to hold back legislation of this character, has compiled 

 interesting statistics showing the advantages in the types of pas- 

 senger car construction. 



On the 247 railroads in the United States there were in service 

 on December 31, 1912, 7,271 steel passenger cars; 3,296 steel under- 

 frame and wooden super-structure passenger cars and 46,926 wooden 

 cars. There were under construction on the same day 1,405 all- 

 steel cars; 190 steel under-frame with wood super-structures, and 

 54 wooden cars. There were acquired in the calendar year of 

 1912, 1,829 steel cars; 555 steel under-frame with wooden super- 

 structure cars, and 276 wooden cars. 



In 1911 the respective figures were: 2,214, 763, 779. In 1910 

 the figures were: 2,016, 538 and 1,084. In 1909 they were: 488, 

 425 and 967. Thus it can be seen that, allowing for the natural 

 increase in the total number of cars demanded, the type of con- 

 struction has swung from a preponderance of wooden cars to a 

 vastly greater preponderance of all-steel cars. 



The demand fbr cars with steel under-frame and wooden super- 

 structure seems to have been maintained rather uniformly np to 

 1912, when a large number of the cars of this type of construction 

 were changed over to the all-steel cars, and in addition the demand 

 for the wooden car fell oft" to a practically negligible figure. Of 

 course, in the year 1912 the figures were necessarily smaller in 

 all lines because of the retrenchment policy followed by the 

 majority of the railroads of the country. 



It is exceedingly interesting to compare the figures for the 

 United States with similar figures for Canada. On December 31, 

 1912, there were in service in Canada: 1 steel passenger car, 14 

 steel under-frame and wooden super-structure passenger cars, 4,876 

 wooden cars. There were under construction or contracted for on 

 that same day in Canada, no steel cars, 71 steel under-frame aad 

 wooden super-structure cars and 446 wooden cars. In 1912 the 

 corresponding figures were: 1, 6, 533. In 1911, 1910 and 1909 

 there were no steel or steel under-frame cars acquired, and the 

 purchases of wooden cars were: 231, 178 and 121 for the respective 

 years. These figures, together with the figures for the United 

 States, offer material for mature reflection on the part of the 

 transportation companies and the lumber trade of the United 

 States. In this connection it is interesting to note just what is 

 meant by the various types of construction and to note further 

 the progress in the so-called modern type of steel construction. 



To begin with, the demand for the all-steel car construction 

 began with the completion of the Pennsylvania railroad tunnel 

 under the Hudson river. There was a public demand which abso- 

 lutely necessitated the entire elimination of any article of wood 

 in the tunnel itself. With the completion of these steel tunnel 



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