CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS, the railway sys tem operated as a unit under a Board of Directors appointed by the Dominion Government, and consisting chiefly of five formerly separate railways. Two of these, the Intercolonial and the Na tional Transcontinental, were built by the government as instru ments of national policy. Three others, the Canadian Northern, the Grand Trunk, and the Grand Trunk Pacific, were privately owned systems whose impending bankruptcy at the time of the World War, 1914-1918, impelled the government to come to their aid with financial assistance which reached such proportions that the taking over of the railways followed as a matter of course.
Under government management an operating deficit of 35 million dollars in 1920 had been replaced by an operating profit of 56 million dollars in 1928 without prejudice to rates, wages, or bond holders' equity.
Unlike the nationally owned or controlled railways of most other countries, the Canadian National Railways are not a monop oly but form the largest competitive railway system in the world, with 23,700 miles of main track extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and serving every important city and every province of Canada, as well as adjacent sections of the United States. Its general offices are at Montreal, Que. The equipment at December consisted of 2,746 locomotives, 97,188 freight cars, 3,070 passenger-train cars, and 5,915 service cars. During the year revenue passengers and 38,807,718 tons of reve nue freight were transported. Gross and net operating revenues for the same year were respectively $173,184,5o1 and $14,258,253. In addition to its freight and passenger business, the system oper ates nation-wide express and commercial telegraph services, a coast-to-coast chain of hotels and summer resorts, and a line of steamships serving the Pacific coast and Alaska. Separately oper- ated, but closely allied is the line known as Canadian National (West Indies) Steamships. (S. J. H.)