The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1872-05-14
TIE NEW CITY RAILROAD.
CHARLESTOWS SOLUTION OF THE
RAPID TRANSIT PROBLEM.
A Passenger and Freight Horse-Rail-
road to GIrdIe the City-Active Opera
tions Begun-The Route and Plans OF
the New Company-An Early Open
ing OF the Road Promised.

lex VA suc EOdo HTOhklScus
In this age of steam and the telegraph
when the old saw that slime is money" is be
coming every day more emphatically true
there Is hardly any department of business
enterprise that receives more universal at
tentlon than the rapid transportation of pas
sepgers and merchandise from point to point
and especially from the seaboard to the inte
rior. In Charleston, with its superb adVan'
tages as seaport. and with its geographical
position as the natural entrep0t and outlet of q
great State, and indeed of vast stretch oil
Southern country rich in natural resources,
the question of the prompt handling OF the
Immense bulk of natural products that comes
crowdlng from the Interior, and the great car
goes of imported articles that daily load its
busy wharves, becomes one of paramount
Importance; and 1t is, therefore, no more than
natural that Charleston should take the lead
in inaugurating new system of inter-mural
transit which, although now novelty, must
in time become necessary feature of the
trade of every great city. The question that
has long puzzled Charleston, and Indeed every
great seaboard city, is as 10 The means OF
handling vast bulks of merchandise within
the limits of the city. here, as In many other
cities, the fleets of merchant steamers are
continually bringing merchandise to our
wharves on the one side of the city, while
on the other side the trains of the various ruil-
roads centerIng at this point are daily dis
charging their freight of the products of the
Interior. What Is Imperatlvely demanded now
is an effective methed OF inter-communicatioa
between these respective ccnveyances. This
method must be
RAPID, cFEtP AND SAFE.
The tracks of the steam railroad companies
might be extended through The heart of the
city and the locomotives drag the heavy trains
down to the various wharVes, and this would
be cheap and rapid, but not safe. Or the ar
rangement might be left as it now exists in
this and most other cities, and the freight
taken from railroad to steamboat and vice
versa By drays, which arrangement is eminent
ly safe, but is insuficiently cheap and rapid. In
various other cities many halfway schemes
have been adopted 70 remedy this difficulty.
In all Mose places the city authorities. with a
wise and proper regard for the safety of the
Inhabitants, have decreed that the locomotives
shall not come through the city streets, and In
many of them, as, for instance, In the case OF
the Harlem, New Haven and Hudson River
Roads, In New York, the engines are LETT at.
the passenger stations, on the edge of the city,
and the freight cars hauled by horses to freight
depots In The centre of the town; but that
brings the freight only halfway to Its destina.
tlon, and it has then to be unloeded, put upon
the clumsy, clattering trucks, and carted to
the wharves or warehouses where 1t is to be
shipped or stored. This, 1t will be seen, ne
cessItates one hauling of the freight, which
might be avoided, and involves also the delay
of the passage of heavy drays through crowd
ed streets.
1t Is now proposed In Charleston by the En-
terprlse Railroad Company to build railroad
through this city which shall combine the fea-
lures of an extension of the stean-railroad
lines to the wharves, q freight horse railroad
Independent of but connecting the steam
lines, and passenger horss-rallroa1, which
will form belt around the lower end, and
straight across the middle OF the city, and
stretch away up the centre of the peninsula to
Magnolia on one side and the Schutzenplatz
on the other.
THE ROUTE
proposed for the new railroad is very COM
preheeslye one One Of the main termini Of
the road will be on the South Battery, at or
near the corner of East Bay. Here 1t is pro-
posed to erect q suitable building, or else
adapt some house already standing, for the
use Of passengers waiting for the cars, which
will run in both directions from this point.
On the east side of the city, the road will run
up East Battery and East Bay, past the long
line OF wharves aud warehouses on the
Bay, and with spurs or branches running
down on the wharves, to Calhoun street;
Though Calhoun to Washington, and up
Washington to Chapel street, on the corner Of
Sb.ch stands the depot Of the Northeastern
Railroad Company. Here switch will con-
pect the track of the new road with that of
the Northeastern Railroad, and the passenger
and light freight cars Of the new road will
also run past the No rtheastern depot for the
accommodation of passengers and Of such
freight as will have to be removed from the
cars The line then continues through
Chapel and John streets TO Meeting, aud
there forms a junction with another short
section OF the road which, leaving the line
just described at the corner OF East Bay and
Calhoun streets, runs west to Meeting, ana
up Meeting to John street. At John street
connection will be made with the South Caro-.
Ina Railroad similar TO the connection with the
Northeastern Road above mentioned, and the
line will then continue up through Meeting to
poi8t beyond the limits of the city, where 1t
branches off to the right to The Magnolia
Cemetery and to the left to the Schutzenplatz.
At the corner OF Spring and Meeting streets,
moreover, another branch starts through
Spring street, running the whole length Of
that street, and connecting at Its western end
with the Savannah and Charleston Railroad
RETURNING DOWN TOWN
from that point, and on the western side of
the city, the line runs through Spring street
to President, down President and Lucas 10 Ca
houn, through Calhoun to Smith. down Smith
to Beaufain, through Beaufan to Logan, down
Logan to Tradd, through Tradd to Legare,
down Legare TO the South Battery. and
o., Dol @l~