Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-12-16
COST Or COAL.
WHY CALIFORNIA RA1LRoADING Is
so EXPENSIVE.
Foot the Bills in the
End.

article that appeared in yesterdays San
Francisco Examiner, relates TO an import
ant feature in the economics of railroading
upon the Pacific coast, notably in Cali
fornia.
We invite attention to the extract,
which clearly, and without room for any
denial, proves that the cost of operat-
ing railroads in California is greatly
heavier than at the East, because of the
extraordinary high price charged for coal
in California, compared to the prices East
ern railway systems pay for fuel of better
quality:
L. The cost of coal to the Chicago. Milwau.
kee and st. Paul Railroad is 50 06 per ton.
To the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific,
| 81 SO.
To the Chicago and Northwestern, 81 rs.
To the Lake Shore and Michigan, 81 81.
To the Chicago and Alton. 81 %.
To the Baltimore and Ohio So cents.
| To the Pennsylvania Central, so cents
The average cost of coal to the Southern
Pacific system this year was Sc 81 per ton.
The company has 6 500 miles of road and
! not a coal mine from one end of it TO the
other.
1t costs the Southern Pacific % SO cents
per mile-run for fusl for each locomotive,
while fuel to the eight following roads
| averages 45 cents per mile: Chicago and
| Northwestern, Lake Shore and Michigan
Southern, New York Central, Pennsylva-
mia Central, New York and Lake Erie,
Chicago Milwaukee and st. Paul, Chicago,
| Rock Island and Pacific and Illinois Gen.
| trail.
| The people of California may not care to
! weep over the woes of the Southern Pacific,
but this extra cost does not do anv one here
| any good. On the contrary the money goes
to an overloaded national treasury, never TO
| return to this coast in any shape. If the
Southern Pacific could keep its mile engine
coal average down to the 6 As of the Eastern
| roads 1t would have saved last year So AGO.
600. Or putting the figures the other way:
If the Eastern roads had TO pay % SO cents,
as the Southern Pacific did. it would have
increased their expenses $31, 900, O00 and
wiped out every dividend that they paid.
Now it must be evident to even the most
superficial reader that if it costs, as it
does, the Southern Pacific system of roads
So 81 a ton for coal, while the Baltimore
and Ohio Railway pays but So cents
ton, railroading on the latter line, all
other elements of cost being assumed
to be equal for the purposes of illus
tration, is as proportionally less costly
| as is represented by the difference
between 90 cents and Sc 81. 1t must
be clear to even the most ordinary COM
| prehension that, as the cost of operating
expenses must be borne by the traffic. no
| matter what the character of the carrier
line, the high cost of fuel to the South
ern Pacific system is direct charge and
burden upon the people who use the road,
directly or indirectly, either as trans
porters or passengers or as consumers of
commodities carried.
Either this is true or the railroad car
rier must operate his line at loss If. as
the Examiner article suggests, the Southern
Pacific Company had to pay no more for
its fuel per mile run for each locomotive
than the average cost to the eight named
railroads at the East, it would have saved
last year So, 100000. That saving would
have been put into lessening transportation
rates, or railroad extension, or devoted to
discharge of obligations, or in promoting
improved service or to the fair reward of
the investors-but now matter how, if
saved it would have been saving to every
person having any commercial relation
whatever with railroading over the South
ern Pacific system.
The case IS strongly put in the extract
we make, where it is shown that the cost
to the Southern Pacific system for coal
the past year, if visited upon the
Eastern systems, would have swallowed
up every dividend the latter de-
clared and paid-that is to say, their
operating expenses would have increased
S31, 100000. These showings make clear
exposition of one of the chief additional
costs of railroading in this State, in excess
of operating charges for like necessities Oh
Eastern roads. Under the circumstances.
of which the coal cost is but one, the won
der is that the railroad system in this
State has been operated so economically
and with as low rates of charge for service.
Nr,o dtcn Il l.,,a,n ID