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Show CHARGE FULL RENT FOR CARS In the opinion of W. R. Scott, General Manager of the Southern Pacific Railroad, as expressed to the Railway-Age Railway-Age Gazette, the chief causes of car shortage are loss of time in loading and unloading and neglect to load cars to full capacity- The worst fact is the fact that railroads permit shippers to use cars as warehouses at merely nominal nom-inal rent, and in case of export shipments at no rent at all. This practice could be stopped if the railroads would charge the full rental value of cars, in the form of demurrage, demurr-age, before they begin and after they finish a trip.. If a loaded car takes ten days to make a trip and is then held up by the shipper for a day 10 per cent might be added to the freight bill. At the most the free time should be twenty-four hours, for, as Mr. Scott says, a car of coal can be loaded in a few minutes and, as most coal cars have hopper bottoms, they can be unloaded as quickly. The same statement applies to tank cars, lumber cars and those used for many bulk shipments- When a wagon drives up to a warehouse, it is immediately loaded or unloaded; un-loaded; why not a freight car? If free time were reduced to the period reasonably necessary and if demurrage were charged at the rate of the full earning power of the car, based on the average day's run, there would be a change. |