108 - PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



that railroads have become the favorite means of transport, and, as in the 

 case of the post office and the telegraph, the public vrill often pay a 

 higher price for quicker transit. This element of time has a greater 

 bearing upon the subject of transportation than is generally understood; 

 it is not alone the interest on capital saved; trade combinations are made 

 and plans are consummated which would not otherwise be practicable. 

 Capital can sometimes be turned often at close margins with greater profit 

 to the owner than on a less number of transactions with larger margins. 

 Railroads have become the great distributors, and we are therefore forced 

 to the conclusion that a double track railroad exclusively for freight, 

 honestly built for ready money, will furnish the most eflfective competi- 

 tion. All our estimates of the cost of transportation bj- rail are based on 

 the results of mixed passenger and freight traffic, in which, of necessity, 

 passenger trains have the right of waj-, and freight trains have to lie up 

 much of the time when the\' should be rolling on to their destination; owing 

 to these detentions the present average speed of freight trains is under 

 five miles per hour, while upon a road exclusively for freight, an average 

 of ten miles an hour could be attained, and the capacity of the road so 

 increased that freight charges could be reduced one-half. With such a 

 road to Chicago and St. Louis, (with ultimate extension to other distribu- 

 ting points,) operated in the interest of its respective termini, as the 

 Baltimore and Ohio is in the interest of Baltimore, New York need fear 

 no rivals, and if we are to retain our commercial supremacy such a road 

 is an absolute necessity. The cost of such a work would probably be 

 about 170,000.000 per 1000 miles of double track of the standard guage, 

 or $45,000,000 for the same distance of narrow guage. A large sum, but 

 one which the real estate interests of New York alone could afford to 

 contribute, and which, with the hearty co-operation of the different mer- 

 cantile interests, it is by no means impossible to raise. New York City 

 now loses, in reduced profits on merchandise, reduced rents on real estate, 

 and exorbitant prices for transportation, more than $70,000,000 ever}' 

 year, and could well afford to build such a road alone. But it would also 

 benefit the West to an equal extent, and doubtless some aid for such an 

 enterprise could be secured in that quarter. The capital stocks of all the 

 trunk lines connecting New York with the interior have been watered 

 until the original amounts have been doubled, and in some instances 

 trebled, and they have all been subject, at some period of their existence, 

 to mismanagement and stealing, which has greatly enhanced their cost. 

 They also have been made up by consolidating a large number of small 

 lines built to develop localities without reference to the requirements of 

 through freight traffic, and do a mixed passenger and freight business 

 which greatly reduces their capacity for freight purposes alone. Is it 

 any wonder that with all these defects, and controlled by men whose only 

 aim is to charge rates ' as high as the merchandise will stand ' without 

 being prohibitory, that our commerce is declining in the face of the sharp 

 competition of other cities ? The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad runs for 



