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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



[Skptember, 



statistical information, williout which it is impossible to generalize with se- 

 curity. 



Doiiljtless many of the works of the country will possess abundant means 

 lo sustain their credit ; and among so many enterprises, it is equally probable 

 that some have been undertaken wliich will fall very far short of the expec- 

 tations of their patrons. 



But, whatever may be the general aljiUty of these immense lines of im- 

 provements, it is certain that the success and ])rofitableness of those which 

 are now progressing under the fairest auspices, are not so well established 

 but that it ought to be an object of deep solicitude with their proprietors to 

 find the means of increasing their productiveness. To every State that has 

 embarked in a career of internal improvement, and to every individual who 

 has invested his property in such stock, it is an interesting question to 

 ascertain the most efficient means of equalizing the charges on the trade, and 

 increasing the revenue and tonnage of the line. 



The public improvements of I'ennsylvania are sinking that commonwealth 

 in debt about a million and a half per oilman — or, in other words, the inte- 

 rest on the loans incurred for their construction, added to the annual charges 

 for repairs and superintendence, exceeds the gross revenue of the works from 

 one to two millions of dollars per annum. 



Of the Incorrectness of the Principles on which Tolls are at present assessed. 



To be able to appreciate the necessity of a dei)arture from the principles on 

 which the present charges for the use of our public works are established, it 

 is essential to examine into the eft'eetive operation of the scale now in use. 

 To render the view which I design to take as little complicated as possible, 

 it may be confined for the present to one of the principal divisions of the 

 trade of the country. For, in treating of the laws of trade, it is found con- 

 venient to divide the connuerce of the line into two principal classes ; in the 

 first of which is included all those commodities which will bear but a hmited 

 charge for their trarisportation, and which, if taxed beyond that limit, will be 

 excluded from the line and from market. This division usually consists of 

 stone, coal, lumber, ore, lime, and many agricultural productions. Indeed it 

 embraces all articles which will seek a market along the line in question, and 

 no other ; and in this respect is to be distinguished from that division of the 

 trade which consist of more valuable commodities, and which, if not accom- 

 modated on one line, will find a passage by the route of a rival work. 



Our present investigation will be confined to the first of these divisions. 



The charges which are levied on this trade consist of what are usually 

 termed freight and toll. If the work be a canal, by freight is understood the 

 charge of the carrier, and by toll that of the state or corporation omiing the 

 work. In the management of railroads, it is usual for the company to act as 

 carrier on their own line; aiul to make but one charge, which is called toll, 

 for both objects. In tliis essay I shall make a somewhat different application 

 of these terms, and designate by freight, in either case, every expense actually 

 incurred in the carriage of the commodity, and by toll, the clear profit on its 

 transportation. So that if the carrier, or transporting company, charge seven 

 mills per mile for the carriage of one ton of any article, and tlie cost of re- 

 pairs and superintendence of the line due to the passage of that ton is three 

 mills per mile, I call the freight on the article one cent per ton per mile ; 

 and any charge exceeding this three milk; which is assessed by the state or 

 company, is what I denominate their toll. 



In nearly every tariff of toll adopted in this country, the charge on every 

 article is proportional to the distance it is transported on the hue. The toll 

 is some fixed amount per ton per mile. This scale of taxation, I contend, is 

 improper and unjust. 



To examine the question, let us suppose the article to be lumber, of which 

 the market value, at the point to which it is sent, is 10 dollars per ton. Let 

 us also assume that the cost of producing this article, or preparing it for 

 shipping on the canal, is 6 dollars per ton. It is then most olnious that if 

 the charge for transportation on this commodity exceed 4 dollars per ton, it 

 will be wholly excluded from the line ; for then the cost of carriage, added 

 to the cost of production, would exceed the market value of the article, and 

 there could be no profit to remunerate the producer. But if the charge be 

 less than 4 dollars, there mil l)e a certain profit, and the article will be found 

 to seek the market. 



If now, this lumber is carried a space of 100 miles to its mart, and the 

 charge for freight is one cent per ton per mile, the freight for that distance 

 mil obviously be one dollar, and there will remain a balance of three dollars 

 for the extreme limit which the article will bear to be charged for toll. The 

 toll levied by the state, at one cent per ton per mile, will be one dollar, or 

 one third the amount which the article could in this case sustain. 



Let us next suppose that similar lumber comes upon the line at a distance 

 of 300 miles from the same mart. The charge for freight would now be 

 three dollars, and there would consequently be a residue of only one dollar 

 on which the state might levy for toll. The commodity could bear no more 

 than one dollar, since that sum added to the three dollars freight, would be 

 four dollars, or the difference between the cost of producing the lumber and 

 its price in market. But, by the princiiile of taxation usually adopted, the 

 toll assessed at one cent per ton per mile, would here be three dollars, or 

 three times as much as the article would bear. In other words, at the dis- 

 tance of one hundred miles from the mart, in the usual tariffs, a commodity 

 is charged one dollar where it might bear a charge of three, and at three 

 hundred miles it is charged three dollars where it could bear but one. 



Does it need any argument to prove that a scale producing such resiUts is 



neither compatible with principles of equity or good economy? Is it not 

 manifestly unjust to charge the man who is situated 300 miles from market 

 three times as much as he can afford to pay, while the man at 100 miles can 

 afford to pay three times as nuich as be is charged ? Is it not any thing but 

 good economy to tax all the trade in this article beyond 200 miles so hcarily 

 tliat it is totally driven from the line, when, if the tolls were differently as- 

 sessed, it might be invited, and made to pay a respectable revenue to the 

 state ? And is not the primary object of the work defeated by the adoption 

 of a tariff that excludes those conmiodities from it which it was especially 

 intended to draw to market, an effect which is accompanied by a direct sacri- 

 fice of trade, revenue, and even justice ? 



I think it can scarcely need more than this plain exposition to make clear 

 to any reflecting mind that some of the charges on the public works of this 

 country need revision ; that they are based on priucijiles which are unsound, 

 and at once do injury to the proprietors of the work, and injustice to a large 

 portion of the public. The commonwealth, as the constructor and ow ner of 

 the improvement, is a sufferer in the loss of the trade that is excluded, and 

 the reven\ie that might be derived from it ; the citizens of the emporium 

 w liich is the mart of the line, softer from the contraction of their business in 

 consequence of the exclusion of the articles in which they traftic ; and the 

 country traversed by the improvement, and taxeil, perhaps, for its construc- 

 tion, suffers from its inability to share the benefits which the work was 

 designed to confer. 



Further evidence of the loss of Trade consequent on uniform Charges. 



To render more palpable the fact that a charge for toll proportioned di- 

 rectly to the distance will cause the exclusion of a certain amount of tonnage 

 without conferring any compensating advantage, we will consider the subject 

 with the aid of a diagram. (See Fig. 1.) 



Fig. 1. 



Let M in the figure be the position of the mart, and ML the line of the 

 improvement ; and let us assume, as before, that the commodity will be ca- 

 llable of sustaining a charge of four dollars per ton for its transportation ; 

 that the toll is one cent per ton per mile, the freight likewise one cent, and 

 the cost of carriage on the lateral roads by which the tonnage is brought to 

 the work, is ten cents per ton per mile. 



The distance M n from which this commodity can be brought to the mart 

 at M on the lateral roads n M, n M, will then be forty miles ; and the di-- 

 tance M P which we can afford to carry it along tlie improvement, at an 

 aggregate charge of two cents per ton per mile, will of course be 200 miles. 

 The area of coimtry, therefore, which will supply trade to the line, will be 

 represented by the triangle n P n, having a base n n of eighty miles, and a 

 height M P of 200 miles. 



Now, it is apparent that the line will receive no tonnage of this article, 

 from beyond tlie point P ; and therefore, that if the trade were permitted to 

 come free of toll from beyond that point, there would result a certain in- 

 crease of tonnage, which would be accompanied by no diminution of 

 revenue. 



Under such an arrangement of the tariff, the charge for freight from P to 

 M, for produce coming from the country beyond P, would be only two dol- 

 lars, and there would consequently be left a balance at P of two dollars out 

 of the limit of four dollars which the article could sustain, to bear the cost 

 of its carriage along the lateral roads to the improvement, and down the im- 

 provement to the mart. 



This balance will be sufficient to pay the cost of transportation on the 

 lateral road from y to P, a distance of twenty miles, at ten cents per ton per 

 mile ; and the charge for freight along the improvement, from R to P, a dis- 

 tance of 200 miles, at one cent per ton per mile. It would, therefore, be 

 within the ability of the state or company, in this example, to extend the 

 benefits of the improvements 400 miles into the interior instead of 200, and 

 increase the tonnage of the line, with all the incidental advantages, 50 per 

 cent., without sustaining any loss of revenue. 



It is far from my intention here to advocate a tariff arranged with a view 

 to this efteet, but merely to show what is lost by those which are commonly 

 adopted. Instead of draining only the country contained in the triangle 

 H P H, which will supply the trade where the charge for toll is one cent, and 

 freight one cent, by charging toll from M to P, and permitting all articles 

 brought from beyond the angle P to pass free of toll, the shaded triangle 

 V R y in the figure will be added to the area using the work and supplying 

 its tonnage. The value of the improvement to the country will be increased 

 one half ; the trade of the city at M w ill hkewise be increased one half, and 

 the value of the property of the commonwealth, as far as it is dependent on 

 the activity of the work, will be ptoportionally augmented. 



