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Show NINETEEN TRAINS HELD UP ON ACCOUNKIP 8N0WST0Rfl Men and Machines and Tons of Salt Employed in City in Effort to Keep Trolley Lines Open; Railways Fighting. ATTEING desperately and mp-c-as- Tj ingiy, y-alt Eake City and tlio In-' " X termo'intaiu count ry succeeded I 3 yesterday in breaking, to a con Mdcrablo extent, Li io grip of the storm king who had held almost undis-' pu I'd swn y for more than forty-eight bonis. But. with the, loosening of the grip here t lie sionn t ook a fi esu grip on western Wyoming to such an extent that the Union I'acllir. for the first time in twenty twen-ty years, was snowbound in mat etatf. Tii'- chief trouble was experienced in t lie vl-dlilty of Ea ramie, and t h runs boil t the day, according to reports, nut a train moved between Ea ramie and Rawlins. N I net een l ra i ns w ere heJd up at va rious points le-;i n.-ifc of iluj snow bltwkarle. None of the Union PncjnV connecUons from the east reached here yesterday and the indications are that the first of tine delayed trains will not arrive in Salt Ifike until about 5 or (J o'clock this mo mine. Other ra H roads operating into Salt Eake, however, made considerable headway in the battle against the storm it nd passenger tra i ns on th-. ma in lines were brought into the city nearly on schedule. Traction Company Suffers. The 1lah Eight fc Traction company If the chief sufferer in the city. Service Ser-vice to the, outskirts of town was badly demoralized throughout the day and, under favorable conditions, the officials of the company do not expert to have all lines in operation before tomorrow or possibly Sat urday. Snow sweepers were used until the stee brooms wure worn short and made practically useless; in fact, even," sweeper is nut out of commission until new brooms liave been provided. The snow was packed so tlghtlv that tine sweepers made but little headway. Every available avail-able man was put to work with picks and shovels in an effort to clear the tracks before the arrival of the s'orm, now active in the northwest, and which it is predicted will reach Salt Eake some tfme today. Fort Douclas still is marooned In ?o far as street car service Is concerned and has been since Christmas morning. The soldiers, however, have succeeded in breaking a trail through the snow so that teams may get to town for supplies. sup-plies. Out of Commission. All suburhan lines still are out of commission. com-mission. The State street line was opened during the day as far as old Thirteenth South street and a gang of fifty men was kept at work with picks and shovels in an effort to open the line to Sandy. The Ninth East and Wanda-mere Wanda-mere lines were operated practically on schedule and the service doubled on the Wandamere line to care for the traffic from South Fourth East, which still is tied up. The Third and Ninth avenue lines also were out of commission, but some ser- vice was performed on the Sixth avenue line. The South Temple street line was open and double service performed to care for the Third avenue traffic. The Center street. Fair grounds. North Fifth West and "West Second South lines were operated about on schedule, and the West Seventh South line was operated as far as Sixth South street. In most : Instances it was not necessary to double-j double-j head cars to get through the snow. Tons of Salt Used. I The thermometer registered 10 degrees : above zero In the city at 6 o'clock yesterday yes-terday morning and it remained low throughout the day. Last night it began be-gan to recede further and at 10 o'clock the mercury had backed down to 8 above zero. The low temperature only froze the snow a little harder and made the effective ef-fective use of brooms a practical impossibility. impos-sibility. As men to wield picks and shovels began to fail to meet the demand, I lie street car company resorted to the I use of salt in an effort to thaw the frozen snow. Tons of salt were sprinkled alonj- the Warm Springs line -with a view to making it possible to operate the cars as far as the West high school. The same method of procedure was followed on other lines and if the supply of salt, men and picks and shovels holds out and the predicted storm fails to reach here in the meantime it Is possible that all the street car lines will be open for t raffle by tomorrow night. I Conditions on the CentervIIle line I showed little improvement during the ' day. Two snow plows or sweepers still j were marooned in the vicinity of Bounti- ful, as were three passenger cars. The ! Centerville, Ilolliday and Sandy lines probably will not be open before Satur- , day night, even under favorable con- j ditions. First Mail Through. Because of the interruption in street car service. Murray and Sugarhouse yesterday yes-terday received their first consignments of mail from the Salt Eake postoffiee since Monday. Likewise the first mail to reach here from those points since Monday arrived yesterday. The exchange ex-change of mall was made possible through the use of motor trucks, as the street car lines io both Murray and Sugarhouse still are out of commission. Despite the extremely cold weather, the interurban lines and steam railroads in Utah, except the Union Pacific, operated trains yesterday in pretty good shape. The Park City branch of the Denver & Rio Grande was opened Tuesday night, after the train to Park City had fought snow near the Summit county line for more than ten hours. The train tied up at Park City Tuesday night and returned to Salt Eake yesterday afternoon. No service to Park City was performed yesterday yes-terday by tiie Rio Grande, but the passenger pas-senger train is scheduled to leave here this morning on time. The worst drift encountered was near Summit and filled a. cut about twenty feet deep. Some trouble was experienced on the Prove Heher and Bingham branches, but the regular passenger service was performed, per-formed, although the trains were a little off schedule. The Utah lailroad, operated oper-ated by the Denver & Rio Grande and ex- tending from Castigate to Black Hawk. Hiawatt.a and Moni'land, is expected to he ready fur service this morning. It has been snowbound since Christmas day. j Fight Low Temperatures. j The Provo branch of tlie Salt Eake Route also was opened yesterday. Eiule i rouble has be n experienced on the main i line of the yIi Eake Route on account of the snow, and t he on ly snow trouble on tlie Western Pacific and Southern Pacific Pa-cific has been in the Sierra Nevadas and has been so slight that passenger trains have been operated practically on time arid freight traffic has been moved about as usual during winter months. With the cessation of winds In northern north-ern Idaho and southwestern Montana, the ' 'rcsron Short Eine w as compelled to be-uin be-uin a battle against extremely low temperatures. tem-peratures. The lowest temperatures were recorded between Spencer, Idaho, and Butte. Mont., and ranged from IS to .11 below zero. No new snow fell yesterday yes-terday in that section and the winds were light. Officials of the road expressed the opinion last night that conditions. In so far as the operation of trains was concerned, con-cerned, were improving all along the line. Southern Utah also felt the cold blasts yesterday morning, when the thermometer registered 20 below zero. The low temperature tem-perature retarded to a certain extent the movement of traffic on the Salt Lake Route, but the most serious damage as a result of the extremely cold weather in that district will be done in the Dixie country, where the winter temperatures usually are little lower than in southern California. No reports have been received re-ceived from Dixie, but it is feared that much suffering may have been brought about because the residents are ill-prepared to protect themselves against rigor-ous rigor-ous weather. Interurbans Win Out. After opening its line . near Jordan Narrows Tuesday afternoon the Salt Lake & Utah Interurban experienced little further fur-ther trouble with the snow and the low! temperature interfered very slightly with the movement of trains. All passenger schedules were filled yesterday, and the1 trains arrived and departed practically on time. ! Through strenuous efforts the Salt Lake ; & Ogden interurban has managed to keep1 its line open and its trains practically on time since the storm began. The Ogden, Og-den, Logan & Idaho interurban line also has had a stiff battle with the elements, but reported that the line was open all tlie way to Preston yesterday afternoon. The company was less fortunate, however, on the Huntsville branch, which was snowbound all day yesterday and probably prob-ably will not be open until some time today. to-day. The coal situation la growing more serious se-rious In Salt L,ake and the entire mountain moun-tain country each day that transportation facilities are interrupted. Practically ever since the cold weather began, more than a month ago, the supply of coal in Salt Eake has been no more than adequate to care for immediate demands, while there baa been some suffering in the outlying . districts. Mines Are Retarded. The holiday season naturally lessens the production at the mines, and on top of tlie holidays came the storm, which practically stopped production at all Utah mines for another forty-eight hours. Some of the mines still are unable to work, and what few were working are not working anyway near full time. The meager supply of coal in Salt Lake is being depleted rapidly, and the move- ment of coal loaded before the holidays is being seriously delayed because of the I weather conditions. 1 Several hundred cars of commercial ! coal are reported between Helper and Salt Eake. but the movement necessarily neces-sarily slow. Also the movement of empty emp-ty cars to the mines Is being badly hampered ham-pered and the future supply of empty cars will be limited for a week or more because of the delay In movement of the cars under load. The severe weather not only affects the movement of loads and empties in transit, but it seriously hinders hin-ders the handling of cars in the local roal-road roal-road yards. Coal for locomotive use also Ts getting scarce on the railroads. The Oregon Short Line depend almost exclusively upon the mines of the Carbon and Emery county districts to supply the needs of the company com-pany in Utah. With the difficulty in moving loaded cars over Soldier's Summit, Sum-mit, the Short Line supply in Salt LaJte and Ogden has been lowered to an almost Irreducible minimum. The Denver & Rio Grande is in a little better shape, but is not making any boasts of the supply on hand. Coal Situation Serious. The coal situation in Park City and Bingham is said to be serious. With practically none on hand at the various yards, the supply at the homes is practically- exhausted, with little promise of any immediate relief. The railroad companies, com-panies, however, liave promised to move coal in preference to other freight until the condition is relieved. In Park City it is reported that the snow lies nearly four feet on the level and approximately six feet deep in tlie middle of the streets, the snowfall having hav-ing been augmented in the streets by the liberal use of shovels in clearing the sidewalks. side-walks. The Union Pacific is operating trains into Park City about on schedule, but the output of coal from the Wyoming mines is just about as limited now as It is at the Utah mines. Aside from the fact that the roads were closed to Alta for several days and the telephone line out of service for about forty-eltrht hours, that mining: camp has not suffered to any great extent from the storm. It is reported that sufficient coal Is on hand to care for the needs of the camp for some time. Work has been continued despite the storm. One bad slide in the district was reported, re-ported, which killed a horse. E. K. Despain, contractor in charge of the trailers, expects to begin breaking roads about the camp this morning. The snow lies from seven to eight feet deep on the level and several days will be required to open the roads. |