Audubon County Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Audubon Co., Iowa) 1885-1894, 1888-03-01

ton of the accounts of the company and
view of the moving train, will make it man
ifest that the passenger traffic is not remun-
eratiye; to the farther well established fact
that in the United States the lowest rates
known TO the world are given, except in In
dia, where more than ninety per cent of the
travel is in fourth-class trains, and the work
is done by the poorest paid peasant laborers
in the world; to the fact that in England
the rate per mile is for first-class trains
three and one-half cents per mile;
for the second-class trains two
and one-half cents; in France the rate
is about the same as in England, and that In
Germany the rate for frst-class trains ID
three and twenty-six hundredths cents per
mile, and for secOnd-class trains, two and
eleven-hundredths cents per mile, and to the
further fact that the average rate earned by
all the railroads in the United States was for
The year 1886 as shown by Poors Railroad
Manual only 2.1S1 cents per mile, as against
2.191 in 1885, 1850 in 1884, 2.422 in 1883,
and 2.514 in 1882.
Having considered all these well estab-
lished facts, it is not hard to claim that
proposition at once by law TO reduce maxi
mum passenger rates in Iowa below the
lowest average ever obtained in the United
States is one which imposes upon those pro-
posing such law the necessity of making
out very clear case.
All railroad authorities and all writer's
upon the railroad question agree that the de-
mands of iirst-cass passenger traffic are OF
such character with reference to QUILT,
speed, equipment and expenditure of money
for the comfort of the passenger that many
believe it does not pay anything. while Others
hold that little or no money is made there
from. Jean, Railway Problems, page 264.
Hadly, page 100. Price, an English writer,
by careful calculation concludes that the cost
of first class passenger trains is seventy three
per cent of the amount received, while the
Railroad Gazette places the percentage OF
cost, after most careful computation, at
eighty-fve to ninety per cent. Take the
English calculation, seventy-three per cent,
and you have a profit Of five mills ana
four-tenths per mile, on two cent per mile
rates. Or, to make this matter a little
palmer, on the English calculation, on car
rying passenger from Burlington to Cres-
ton, one hundred and ninety miles, at two
cents per mile, the profit to the railroad COM
pany would be about one dollar and seventy
one cents on the American calculation, the
profit would be thirty-eight cents.
Statistics show that in Belgium, England
and the other densely populated countries
of Europe, not more than one-half of the
seats in railway car are filled. Making
allowance for the short rides, from station
to station, and supposing the railroad COM
pany to carry one-third Of its car seats full.
fIom Burlington TO Creston, one hundred
and ninety miles, we would have on the
English estimate, returns per car three dol
lars and forty cents; on the American basis
seven dollars and sixty cents; and, with
four cars TO the train thirty dollars and
forty cents profit for the whole train, or
about twenty-siX cents per train mile. At
TIE rates now fixed, the lowest maximum
being three cents per mile, and much of the
mileage Of the State being at higher max
imum, the railroads of Iowa earned per
train mile in the year 1881, sixty-three
cents.
1889. .......................4 As cents
1888. Observation-Disclosures cents