Los Angeles daily herald., 1890-01-26
SUNDAY, JANUARY 2s, 1890.
Railroads ina the snow Belt.

This has been the most severe winter
in many respects ever experienced on
this Coast. The fall of rain in the
southern pare and the fall of snow in the
northern and mountainous parts have
been 80 heavy and constant that wash
cuts and blockades have been the order
of the day for nearly two months. The
present snow blockades in the Sierra
Nevadas and on the Oregon-C California
road are unprecedented. Never before
has the snow so long defied the energies
and resources of the officers of the Gen.
trail Pacific as this winter. Blockades
have baen frequent heretofore, but the
snow plow has always opened the road
in two or three days. This time trains
that left Oakland on the 18th, 10th and
18th instant are showed up all along the
top of the Sierras. The trains coming
west are also showed in at various points,
or shut out at and beyond Truckee. The
fact is therefore emphasized that for ten
days and over no train has got through
the snow belt OF the Central Pacific from
either side.
A remarkable feature of shis win.
ter's blockade is that the company
was better prepared than ever before to
keep the road open, and yet never before
so sigrally failed. The old-fashioned
snow w-plow that successfully contended
with light blockades in the past had been
superseded by new and powerful rotary
plow, which it was believed could make
its way through any bank or drift it could
possibly encounter. Whilst their new
machines were an immense improve
ment on the old ones, yet they were not
equal othe emergency. The snow was
so much deeper and denser than ever be-
fore that even these colossal rotaries,
sending the snow right and left into the
air like the upshoot of a submarine vol
cano, were unequal to the task of clear
ing the road.
The experience of the Central Pacific
road in the Sierra Nevadas this winter
settles all the fimsy talk of our San
Francisco neighbors about inducing the
Eastern overland roads seeking this coast
to cross the Sierras at any of the make
believe passes at the head of the Stanis-
laus, Tulare or other rivers, or to tackle
the passage of the Sierras at any point in
The central or northern part of the State.
they will come by the true railroad
gateway to the Pacific, by the great
Interior Basin from Utah to Los
Angeles. That is the natural road
10 reach this coast. 1t avoids heavy
'nows and steep grades, and when
by the cost OF operating the
tremendous gradients and curves Of the
,ierras, it is several hundred miles
shorter than any geographically direct
.oute.
These are facts which will not be lost
sight of by contemplating railroad build
ers. A road which can be kept open all |
winter as against road that is liable to be |
blockaded for ten or fifteen days at a
time, is immeasurably the most valuable.
Whilst the snowfall in the Sierras this
winter was much greater than usual, yet
the company we're better prepared than
heretofore to handle it; and their failure
to do so, under the circumstances, seals
the Sierra route to all new roads coming
here. Indeed the Central Pacific is an
abnormity, and never would have been
built where it is on legitimate or CONNER
cial principles. 1t is war road, built
out of the necessities of the country
during great crisis in the history of the
rebellion, and the cost or any part of its
economical features was not taken into
consideration. 1t was the cry of road
at any cost by any route that pushed it
through where a road under normal
circumstances never would have been
built.
But there will be no more Central
Paci6cs built.