Construction of railways, considering the limited capital re sources of the earlier periods, became rapid throughout the more developed portions of the country after the close of the decade that ended with 183o. In that year the total length of railway lines was just under 4o miles; in 1831, it had increased to 98.7 miles; in 1832, to 229 miles; and by 1835, to 1,098 miles. The growth of mileage, by sections, from 184o to the latest date for which data are available is shown in Table I.
*Includes Louisiana. tIncludes Minnesota.
(H. 1'. N.) Railroad Consolidation.-The processes of consolidation have acted upon railroads from their earliest days with the result that the thousands of independent companies have been reduced to less than loo unified systems. As a single and not unusual ex ample, the present New Haven Railroad is composed of what were once about 200 separate enterprises. The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, in the Northern Securities Case (1904), that the Sherman Anti-Trust Act applied to railroad con solidation, retarded such projects, especially those motivated by the desire to reduce competition.
After two years of war-time operation of all railroads as a single system by the government, the properties were returned to independent operation under the Transportation Act of 1920. That act, among other things, promulgated a new rule of rate making which directed the Interstate Commerce Commission to set rates so that railroads as a whole might earn a fair return on property value. Congress recognized the fact that, under uniform rates on competitive traffic, a scale which would yield a fair re turn to railroads collectively would yield more than that return to the strong and less to the weak.
To solve the problem of the weak road the act directed the Commission to prepare a plan under which the many roads would, without undue reduction in competition, be consolidated into a limited number of large systems of fairly equal earning power, so that, under uniform rates on competitive traffic, each would earn approximately the same rate of return.
The tentative plan, published in 1921, had prolonged discus sion and the final plan was not published until December, 1929. It called for 21 consolidated systems. The depression was then in its first stages and diverted attention from the plan, and the severity of the losses in earnings through 1931-1935 threw many properties into the hands of receivers or trustees. In the mean
time, in 1933, Congress changed the rule of rate-making by elimi nating any reference to fair return on value.
It now appears that there is little likelihood of a revival of interest in a country-wide, comprehensive plan of consolidation, but consolidations, along natural lines, will be made here and there as in the past, whenever the proposal is found by the Commission to be sound and in public interest.
Because of the elimination of smoke, electrification is espe cially suitable in tunnels. A serious accident in the smoke-filled Park Avenue tunnel forced the electrification of the Grand Cen tral Terminal in New York. Electrification has been found well suited also to suburban rail service and on heavy mountain grades, and experience has indicated that it brings substantial increases in capacity where traffic is unusually heavy. The factor of increased capacity was given much weight in the decision of the Pennsyl vania Railroad, to extend its electrification from New York to Philadelphia and Washington.
There are, however, few railroad divisions which have traffic in volume sufficient to justify the high capital expenditures. When a railroad is electrified the additional capital cost adds as much as or more than 5o percent to the investment in fixed property, and electric locomotives now cost twice as much as steam locomotives of equal power. The economies in locomotive fuel and maintenance are substantial, and there are many other advantages in electrification, but the carrying charges on the additional investment are usually in excess of the economies.