CONFERENCE ON TRANSPORTATION 



President White : We will take up the question in an informal 

 way. Mr. Locke, will you give us your experience along this line? 



Mr. Locke: My experience has not been very satisfactory. 

 In a great many instances, we have met with loss as a result of delays. 

 It has been almost impossible to get anything from the companies, 

 and we have merely given up any such idea. We have quite a good 

 deal of difficulty in getting cars. This last fall we had in orders for 

 cars for quite a few days. I know an instance where strawberry 

 growers failed to get cars after a company had agreed to furnish them, 

 and the latter paid voluntarily for their negligence some six thousand 

 dollars. I think we are to blame quite a good deal when we do not 

 get cars. 



President White: I think there is no question but, if we had 

 some system by which we could get together, we could get after these 

 railroad claims. But we are working singlehanded. A gentleman 

 in the Erie Railroad Claims Department made the statement that 

 every claim was first put in a pigeon hole. If it was pushed, they 

 tried to get out of it. The gross injustice to shippers, for instance, 

 along the peach belt, will be seen when it is known that cars have been 

 taken from one siding, removed a couple of stations, and put on a 

 siding again. In some cases cars were two days in going sixty miles. 

 That is altogether unnecessary. The courts have decided that a 

 common carrier, regardless of your directions as to icing, must keep 

 cars iced. The car situation is just as hard to contend with, but 

 there is a way out of it. I was told of an instance where shippers 

 became much incensed, and actually began to draw produce in pack- 

 ages and place it on the railroad company's grounds. The railroad 

 sent an engine a long distance to place cars on the siding for them. 



Mr. Aldrich: Up to within two years, the Long Island Cauli- 

 flower Association has been shut down on sometime during every 

 season. As some of you know, it is absolutely necessary that a ship- 

 ment reach its destination on time, or there will be a glut. We have 

 said to the railroad, "You start your train early enough to get ship- 

 ments there. We would like to have you wait as long as you can, 

 but do not wait so long that you cannot get there on time." They 

 realize that we mean it. For the past two years we have not had any 



