Show D R G IMPROVEMENTS One and a Half Millions For i few N Trackage and Equipment Denver Colo Jan President E T Jeffery of the Denver Rio Grande I railroad who has just returned from the east announces that the company I will spend this year 1500000 for new trackage and equipment Sixty miles I of the San Luis valley line will be changed to standard gauge twenty I seven miles of entirely new roadbed being constructed The company has ordered 8000 tons of steel rails from the I Colorado Fuel Iron company The Colorado Southern company has also contracted for thirty miles of I steel rails which will be laid between Wichita Falls Tex and Fort Worth In this connection the Denver Republican Repub-lican says The Denver Rio Grande Railroad company has decided to make extensive Improvements and additions to the equipment of its various lines of railway rail-way m Colorado President E Jeffery returned from New York and Chicago yesterday morning and authorized the following statement We now propose to run a standard gauge road into the San Luis valley from La Veta station so that we may place standard gauge cars at the important I im-portant shipping points in the valley n and run standard gauge passenger and sleeping cars from Denver to Alamosa which is the central part of the San Luis valley We shall add 1000 freight cars to our standard gauge equipment and at least ten heavy locomotives and perhaps per-haps more We will also buy about 8000 tons of steel rails These large outlays are evidences of the confidence that the management ot the Denver Rio Grande has in the future of Colorado The Denver Rio Grandes record for the six months ending Dec 31 show practically the same earnings from all sources as for the last six months of 1898 But the tonnage carried was a great deal larger during the six months just closed than it was for the other six months referred to which is substantial sub-stantial evidence of the prosperity Colorado Col-orado now enjoys I The increase in tonnage is in all classes of freight including especially all kinds of mineral ore coal and merchandise mer-chandise and it is for to and from all districts within the state which are reached by the Denver Rio Grandes lines The system comprises nearly onehalf of the railway mileage of the state and reaches the most of the important im-portant mining camps and many of the agricultural districts The volume of traffic moved at various var-ious times is unquestionably an index of the prosperity of the state Concerning his visit in the east President Pres-ident Jeffery said I had a very pleasant trip I spent nearly a week in Jew York and a week in Chicago During this time I saw a great many prominent men who are engaged in financial commercial and manufacturing interests All of them are gratified at the evidence of prosperity everywhere and are strong I in their belief in still more improved conditions during the year 1899 I |