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Show COMMERCE OF WORLD WILL r BEJFFECTED Panama Canal Will Change Distances Between Peru of Both Hemispheres. JOHNSON REPORT COMPLETE IN CHARACTER Monumental Task of Expert Ex-pert to Determine Effect of Opening Waterway. BY FREDERIC J. HAfeKIN When the United States was eon-sidering eon-sidering the advisability of undertaking undertak-ing to build the Panama canal President Presi-dent McKinley looked the country over for the Ixst authority on transportation transporta-tion and commerce, to serve on the canal commission and to prepare an Hileuuate report on tke industrial and commercial value of an isthmian canal. He finally selected Prof. Emory R. .jk Johnson, professor of transportation and JM con, merer at the I'niversity of Penn f ylvnia. The Johnsou report wa a most comprehensive one, and one tkat went far toward demonstrating lh prospective value oi suck a waterway. When the time came to fix tk toll on tin ranal Professor Johnson again waa drafted into service to bring bis inquire up to date and to revamp it in line with the developments of the ilecade that elapsed since tbe previous r port Has made. Professor Johnson made an extended inquiry into all mat ters pertaining to the aiuoi.nt ot traf lit odi.nte.l. the rkaracter of this traf fie, the conditions that might influ ence it by tending to drive it away or to lead it to choose he Panama roue over other ru'ites, sud into the traffic klWty of other great artificial water-wave. water-wave. Hi.- fi.st line of inquiry related to Via " an attempt to show just v-hiit will be tliv natural .nurse, of ili;; ui:g alter llie canal is constructed. While reatirrrig that other elements, in eluiltng ctuiliug and provisioning facilities, facili-ties, amount of way eurtro. and the like, tend to counteract distsnee considerations con-siderations when s ship owner plans ! the route of 'us ships, st the same time j distances are the first consideration., lie finds that the longer of the two1 .routes may bo the more profitable one if there be .' greater volume of inter-it inter-it odirte traffic. At th same time, it ( may be the more prof liable if the , mice of 'muii and tlie number of eosl- ; iug station! are to its advsntngc. , Lower insurance rates may overcome distance and toll charges may be so, h-gh as to divert traffic. His problem I was to assess all these matters at their true value and, with this assessment in mind, lo (fry to forecast the amount of trade that will be available at Panama C and to fix a rate of foil that would RjU yield the maximum return and at the aaPb same time make the canal of maximum maxi-mum benefit to the world shipping. Cats Distances In Halves. lie finds that the canal will shorten the water distance .from the east coast of the United Suites to the west coast bv mays than half. It will place New rorh more than 50M miles nearer to thy great nitrate beds of Chile, ajid I Continued1 on page 2. miles nearer thaa kw Ike natural mute via the ape of Oeod Hope. Affect World Oommerce With refer ease to Bam pear, pone it Is found that Liverpool will be over 1500 miles nearer Wellington, Mew Zeev laad, through tke Paaaata canal taaa through ttoea. As It costs approximately approximate-ly 10 feats par register ton per day to keep a freight ship on tag high sans, a ..'ico ton frelgkter would eoet $800 e day. Oae tkooaaad miles would thus coat, if tke iUp tails tea knoas par hour something over ifOOO. From this it will be seen that a ship of this de-vriptloa de-vriptloa eoald sail about MOO rail-as rail-as cheaply at it eaa go through the canal at tke present rate of toll. All ahipping, except where other conditions are uaeuuel, woald find it profitable to fo tbrougk the canal where more than 000 miles at eaa eaa be overcome. Professor Joaasoa presents aa interesting inter-esting study oa tke traffic in sight fur tke canal aad on the indications of in creased traffic, but as tkis will form tke basis of another article, thev are merely referred to kere. One of tke interesting things he brings out U that tke opealag of Ike canal will aeeeasar ilv hasten the passing of tag sailing vessel, since there will be ao facilities for kandling them through tke big waterway. wat-erway. In a third of a century tke world's tonnage of sailing vessel a Has declined from 14,0000,000 to lees tkna 7,000,1100 tons, while at earn tonnage hag increased tenfold from a little more than 4,000,000 to more than 41,-i 41,-i Kin, lion. Eoads Must Out Kates 1 With reference to the relation of the Panama canal to the traffic and rates oa the transcontinental railroads. Professor Pro-fessor Johnson concluded that the railroads rail-roads wil be able to hold oaly a vary small share of the transcontinental traffic, and that they will be under tke necessity of giving verv low rates oa Pacific cnastbound goods originating as far nest as tke Mistissippi. He estimates esti-mates tkat about 3,A0f,000 torn of transcontinental freight are handled a year, of which the railroads have been getting (U per cent. The railroads have been in the habit of ckargigg low rates to tke Pacific, from tke middle west, so as to encourage industries tkera. When the Nevada railwav commission com-mission examined the bills of lading on hipping coming into Ueno it was found that 7J per rent of the incoming freight originated no farther east than Chicago. Professor Johnson thinks that the railroads will practically snr- reader without a flght that traoaconti-nental traoaconti-nental traffic which originatee in nnd east of the Buffalo Pittsburg district, a traffic which embraces about oaa-tkird oaa-tkird of the total transcontinental traffic. Roads within 300 miles of the Atlantic seaboard would rather gat what they eaa by hauling freight to its ports for water shipment than to take a lower rate to deliver that freight to the tranecoatiaantal railroada. His coaclusion with reference to thV effect that the caaal will have on the railroads is that It will hammer down their rates for freight on commodities originating within a thousand miles of either seaboard and destined to points within the 'same range on the other aeaboard. He thinke tkat tke Atlantic aeaboard rates to the Pacific coast will be such that its shippers can quote better rates to Pacific coast points than caa the shipper in the middle west, and that, thus the eastern part of the 1'nited States will get a larger share of the trade west of the Rockies thitn It now enjoys. He believe that the railroads aaet of Cleveland and In dianapolia will bid for business to br handled via the Atlantic seaboard and that those as far north aa .St. Louis and Kanaaa City will bid for it to be handled via New Orleap- and Galveston. Galves-ton. People Would Not be Helped. With reference to the effect that the presence or absence of tolls will have oa coastwise traffic. Professor John-eoa John-eoa save that it might be of some as-alstance as-alstance to lobber ami large shippers to exempt the coatwise ships, and also that it might give the east a little more advantage over the middle west in trading with the far west. He does not think that tbe amouut of the exemption, ex-emption, about 00 eeata a ton on the goods carried, will appreciably affect tke rates rkarged hv toe regular steam skip line?-, and that thev. therefore, aad not the people at large, stand to benefit by the exemption. He reaches the conclusion, baaed on transportation history, that the rates charged by the steamship linee will not be based on the cost of the service, but rather on what the traffic will boar. With this I la miad, it is his coaviction that the impostion of the tolls wll sot make tbe freght rates a cent higher, nor will the exemption from such toll make these rates a cent lower. He says that char tor rates are competitive, and such shippers as can charter a vessel will gat the benefit, but no others. He I therefore opposes the present exemp-Ition exemp-Ition of coatwi-e traffic from the ruo from New York nod Manila aod turn, one through Sues and the othor through Panama. Tha pritaa of saaTt on to two routaa and tha facilities forK taking it -n maka tha voyage tbrmigb Panama eost lata by mora than r than tha voyage through 6ueK. ment of tolls. Professor Johnson gives a historv of traffic condition in the Suel aad other canals aad from that goes on to tbe question of coal cost and coaling facilities fa-cilities as affecting taa several ocean routes. He says that ocean steamships annually consume 73,000,000 tons of coal, representing a cost of a quarter of a billion dollars. He takes two -'r.uner ot Identical deelgn which ail COMMERCE OF WORLD WILL BE AFFECTED (f'oatlnned from page 1.) nearly 4000 miles nearer to Valparaiso. The distance to most transcontinental points are approximately 1000 miles hearer by way of tho Tebauntepec route thaa by tha Panama route. Bat, inasmuch as tha handling of cargo out ,nf one ship and into another at Te-hauutepee Te-hauutepee costs il.76 a ton, aad la addition ad-dition thereto a land transportation of 192 ratlee ig iaToWod. little serious competition com-petition from the Tehauntepec route is feared on through cargo buaineea. The eost of getting a ton of goods through the Panama canal actually will be from 48 to 80 eeata per tea, ao that, although tbe Panama route will be the longer by 1000 miles, It will he cheaper ia tha end The distances saved br the Panama route to Asiatic ports from our own gulf and Month Atlantic, seaboard range from nearly 6000 miles down to some 2000 when compared with taa Eniei route. The diataacea to Australian porta from the porta of onr Atlantic seaboard are brought from 2000 to 5000 |