The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1892-07-09
NEW RAILROADS.

A weekly sheet, which is friendly to the
railroad, sneers at the proposed new rail-
road to Salt Lake, and says that Its pro-
jectors will have 2 good time in getting the
money they need. IL is evidently not
familiar with the temper OF the hnanclal
worId Capitalists in London seem to be
ready to advance money to build any rail-
road which has The least chance OF success.
The latest enterprise which has been
accepted 10 London is one which TO Ameri-
can eyes seems visionary. 1t is railroad
from Winnipeg, in Manitoba, to Fort
Churchill, on Hudson Bay. The distance
is 700 miles. or 400 from the head of Winni-
peg Lake; the route is almost level the
track would follow the valley OF the Nelson
River. Fort Churchill is near the fifty
eighth parallel Of north latitude. Snow falls
there for ten months in the year and it
would need the most improved appliances
in the shape of snowplows to keep the
line open in winter. But the road would
bring the wheat eenters of Manitoba,
Minnesota and Dakota some 700 to 1000
miles nearer Liverpool than they are by
their present outlets; and though there are
only three months In the year when Hud-
son Straits can be navigated. it is argued
that the road would support itself by the
grain freights it would get. Ii London
stands ready to build a railroad on such
prospect as that it ought TO be eager 10 get
a chance of investing money in new trans
continental line from San Francisco.
1t has never been admitted by the pro-
jectors of the new Salt Lake enterprise that
they were affiliated with Eastern men. But
ii is shrewdly suspected that they have at
their back one of the most powerful of the
Illinois and Iowa corporations, the Chi
cago and Northwestern, which is con-
troiled by the Vanderbilts. This line
was extended some years ago as
far as Fort Fetterman in Wyoming, and it
was then proposed TO run or TO Corinne in
Utah so rs to make a connection with this
coast over the Central Pacific, but for some
reason or other The project was not then
carried cut. 1t was said at the time that
the Nanderblts had acquired large inter
est in the Union Pacific, and did not care to
! inauguraTe n competition with the branch
Of that system from Granger into Oregon.
But il was understood in well-informed cir
cles that the original intention was only
postponed, not abandoned. The Wander
bits are not in the habit of giving things
up. If-aS is belieyed-they made up their
minds, even in the lifetime OF the late William
II. Vanderbilt, TO own a lire from coast TO
changed. 1t must always be remembered
that men whose incomes run well mp In the
millions must labor under constant embar-
rassment to find investments for their sur
plus money. The Fanderbilts would prob
ably be well pleased to extend the North
western to San Francisco if they saw even a
modest dividend in prospect.
The same sheet which ridicules the en-
terprise on financial grounds was distressed
TO think that the Salt Lake Railroad could
not tind convenient pass across the mount
aims. There are more passes across the
mountains than people know of, some of
| them much more practical than that
| through Emigrant Gap. In modern en-
| gineering it is no trick to cross a mountain
| range, as Meggs proved in Chile. And
! even if it were found that of all the passes
! the best is the one which is crossed by the
| Central Pacific, the new road could easily
! condemn roadway through that very pass,
as was shown in the controversy between
the AtchisOn and the Rio Grande over the
| Royal Gorge in Colorado