Popular Science Moutlilij 



.54!) 



run beneath the piers of the great ocean steamships. Whole freight cars will be raised and 

 lowered by elevators, and branches will run through the side streets to the consignees 



Conditions in \cw York Harbor, which 

 is ilatcd August, 1915, points out that the 

 total amount of goods moved on the 

 waters of New York Harbor, other than 

 that on ferry boats, in the year 1906 was 

 113,969,355 tons. No one knows what 

 it was worth, but one student of harbor 

 conihtions guessed that it would take 

 approximately ten billion dollars to meet 

 the invoices. 



One-fjuarter of the ferry boats of the 

 United States were to be found in New 

 York Harbor at that time. There were 

 also 5,289 unrigged boats for moving 

 heavy freight around the bay and ad- 

 joining waters. One-half the tremendous 

 volume of products was transported on 

 ligiuers. A considerable part of the 

 etjuipment for handling freight is owned 

 by the railroad companies that have no 

 tracks on Manhattan and cannot lay 

 them down on the island. 



In most communities it is practicable 

 to run tracks alongside the piers, fac- 

 tories and warehouses. It has not been 

 so in New York City in the past. The 



manufacturers and merchants have been 

 obliged to rely upon trucks to get their 

 goods from the railroads and ships to 

 their places of manufacture, storage and 

 trade. 



This has ahvays caused great conges- 

 tion along the waterfront, particularly 

 that of Manhattan. Here the railroads 

 compete with the steamship companies 

 for space to land their freight. The 

 railroad companies do this by establish- 

 ing depots on piers, alongside which they 

 bring great carfloats, floating switches 

 they might be called. So general is the 

 use of carfloats that it has been said 

 that every morning the terminal yards 

 of the great trunk lines in Jersey City, 

 Hoboken and Weehawken are detached 

 from New Jersey and firawn across to 

 New York Cit\-, being returntxl again at 

 nighlfall. 



Trucking, howe%'er, in New York 

 City is costly owing to the high expense, 

 a-ttached to housing and feeding horses 

 and the length of time recjuired to get a 

 load to or from the waterfront because 



