PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-THIRD FRUIT-GROWERS ' CONVENTION. 



105 



cared for in California, for practically all of the Pacific Fruit Express 

 cars are now engaged in serving your shipments and will so continue 

 throughout the winter. The refrigerator cars cost twice as much as 

 ordinary box cars, and in proportion to the actual tonnage loaded are 

 more plentiful. This recognition of your green-fruit industry should 

 be gratifying to you. You have captured fruit markets half way round 

 the world in one direction, and I think I may safely say half way round 

 in the other direction, too. And the management of the Southern Pacific 

 is glad to feel that it has had some part in this spread of California's 

 influence. The value of the fruit industry to the State is recognized to 

 be out of all proportion to its tonnage; it is a great factor in bringing 

 us wealth, in advertising our State's resources, in attracting people from 

 all over the globe. 



The increase in other equipment received or ordered since 1906 is in 

 proportion to the demands of commerce. The last two years have been 

 a trying time for shippers and railroads alike. All over the United 

 States commerce has outgrown the railroads, and even where money has 

 been available to develop the railroads it has been difficult, as in other 

 lines of manufacture, to secure within the ordinary time, or double or 

 even treble the ordinary time, cars, rails, engines, structural material, 

 and the thousand and one mechanical parts absolutely necessary to a 

 railroad machine, whether an engine slide valve, an air brake, or a patent 

 coupler. 



The Pacific System of the Southern Pacific had, in 1906, 1,198 loco- 

 motives and 26.148 freight cars out of the total already mentioned. 

 Since then 184 locomotives and 5.429 freight cars have been received 

 or ordered— an increase in motive power of 16 per cent and in freight 

 cars of 20 per cent. Our latest reports indicate an increase in tonnage 

 up to June 30, 1907. of 11.2 per cent and in car mile movements 11.1 

 per cent and in train miles 11.1 per cent. But the new freight cars are 

 much larger than the old; the engines more powerful. Therefore, to 

 meet your needs during the coming year we will have an increased 

 efficiency in freight cars of probably 25 per cent and in locomotives of 

 20 per cent, whereas no such increase in business is now demonstrated. 

 The prospects for better service are therefore much brighter. Of course 

 the Southern Pacific is. however, affected somewhat by the car and en- 

 gine conditions on every other road in the United States, with all of 

 which we exchange business. If they are unable to meet traffic de- 

 mands, cars which should be returned promptly to the owner move 

 slowly and in some instances can not escape homeward from local ship- 

 pers. The problem is not local to California, nor to Western railroads. 

 But all indications point to better service. There is a further favorable 

 factor. The value of cars lies not in their numbers alone, but in the 

 rapidity with which moved. All summer the Southern Pacific has had 



