Show RAILROADS 11 Will TRY THY TO KILL PANAMA Cl CANAL SAYS ADMIRAL ROBLEY D 0 9 VANS EVANS NEW YORK Feb 14 Rear H.-Rear Rear Admiral Admira Robley D. D Evans who has been explaInIng explaining explain explaIn- ing the probable future of ot the Panama canal in a striking series of articles es In Hamptons Hampton's r t Magazine concludes cY d in est t the forthcoming March number with a direct a attack upon pon the railroads and and theIr ratemaking ratemaking rate ratemaking making methods which Is perhaps the most luid lu ld explanation of ot the whole situation situa situa- tion yet seep seen in print There is n no po more Important question before the American nation today he says sas than this of ot making very sure that when they have invested their hundreds hundreds hun bun of ot millions of ot dollars in the canal It shall be permitted to give them returns on the Investment The Panama canal will earn the re returns returns returns re- re turns albeit perhaps indirectly if It It Is given the chance But it will not be given the tho chance if the transcontinental railroads railroads railroads rail rail- roads can prevent Decade after decade the tho great east- east west and-west railroad systems opposed and prevented the building of the canal They knew what it Its competition would mean in the reduction of ot their freight rates Oregon's Trip Brought Canal The canal however Is being dug Not because the public rose to an acute realization of ot the commercial necessity for tor it It but because of ot the Oregon's trip from fr m the Pacific to the tho Atlantic That one voyage of ot one battleship in a time timo of ot national crisis served to crystallize a n purpose in the tile national mind that all tho the powers of railroad finance and railroad politics could not thwart Today we take a certain pride in the fact tact that American genius and enterprise are achieving the most wonderful engineering engineering engi engi- work ever undertaken by man But we are giving no thought much less taking any steps to assure to ourselves benefits as a nation tho the commercial which that work must bring if It it shall not be a disappointment and a failure Do not imagine that I have become afflicted with any railroad anti-railroad mania There Is not a transportation authority authority authority au au- au- au among all the rulers of the rail who will claim more for the steam railroad railroad railroad rail rail- road as a factor in the tho development of ot the country past present or future than I will concede But the truth will not be suppressed The always have been hostile to the canal and they maybe may maybe maybe be hostile to it in the future I believe their hostility is based on a narrow conception conception con con- a short sighted view But nut reasonable reasonable rea rca or unreasonable it is the fact We are spending digging at a canal which ought to reduce freight ht rates rates' across our continent to a fraction of ot what they are now The commercial justification of ot that expenditure will never be found as I have heretofore tried to show in the impetus that will wl be given our foreign trade It must be found in benefit to our domestic commerce Water Transportation Cheapest Water transportation is the cheapest known to the world Wherever there is free and fair competition the water highway highway highway high high- way takes the business busIness' from the railroad Year after year a larger and larger proportion proportion proportion pro pro- portion of ot London's coal comes down from the north of ot England by the sea Year after atter year the Importance of ot the internal water routes routes rivers rivers and canals canals on on the continent of ot Europe Increase increases as they carry a I steadily Increasing proportion of the freight traffic Why Because It Is Ismore iSmore more moro economical to move traffic by water than by land Yet for tor many years we have consented that the railroads should monopolize tile the transcontinental traffic which a canal would have carried at nt greater vastly less cost We Ve have developed our continent thus far tar without thought of the possibilities s of the greatest transcontinental trade route that route that via the Atlantic the panal tanal and the Pacific and PacIfic and without consideration of ot the possibilities of our Imperial system of rivers The canal is going to force torce attention to these things if It only the country can be aroused to understand its po po- But how many people who read this know that it will wl be possible to ship the oranges of ot southern California from Los Angeles Ies to New York or Boston in fewer days by steamship through the Panama canal when completed than by fast freight across the country The distance from New York to Los Angeles via the Panama canal canai canalis is in round numbers miles A ton capacity steamer loaded with oranges or other fresh tresh fruit steaming at a 0 rate of ot only twelve knots per hour would cover this distance In eighteen days If It we allow one day for the tho e steamer passing a through the g canal her h ht total t time from port to I port would be nineteen days If It the vessel ves yes sal sel w were run u specially 1 for the tho o fruit trade 3 r i this time could 0 be reduced c by several days A ship of sixteen I e knots speed such ge geI 1 as those os now used in the West India c fruit I trade would make the trip in Just fourteen fourteen four tour teen days giving again the allowance of x ono one no day for passing through the canal Time Is Compared The time for tor rail freights across the continent varies from twenty to sixty days It will therefore be seen that the steamer could in all all all' cases land her freight in a shorter time This means that many kinds of ot freight would be de de- de delivered delivered livered in a better condition and for one- one third the price now charged by the rail rall- roads Admiral Evans then goes Into detail quoting specific freight rates from the POt POo Pacific Pa PO- elite then coast attacks to o t the prove O railroads id his sa contentions n vigorously o g ly at and for their policy of ot choking off competition by water Here Is a sample he says of how the off ott process is accomplished accomplished- The Panama railroad once built steamers how many I do not recall to torun torun torun run in connection with the road across the isthmus of Panama These steamers were to carry freight from Now New Orleans to Colon When they were started railroad railroad rail rall- road rates across the continent were cut down to such a figure that the steamers could not be operated Merchants were sighted short-sighted enough to accept the low rates and as a result the ships went to the scrap heap or were sold for tor service In other waters And the railroad rates went back to where they were before the steamship line Une was projected This sort of ot action he maintains re restricts restricts restricts re- re the true development of the coun coun- try The railroads anyhow have practically practically practically cally all the business they can handle Give some of ot it to the Panama canal and the canal will gradually create new business of its own |