The morning call., 1895-02-14
THEY ARE LOOKING FOR A SUB
STANTIAL BOOM IN RAIL
ROAD BUILDING.
PRACTICAL ROUTE SUGGESTED
DAVID E. GORDON OUTLINES THE
POSSIBILITIES OF A LINE AND
IT'S REVENUE.

stantial. David E. Gordon, a public
spirited citizen, spoke freely on this sub
ject to a CALL correspondent to-day.
ave, dwellers by the sea" said Mr.. Cor
don, "can hardly appreciate the announce
ment of snow fifteen feet deep on level,
which came from Sisson, on the Oregon
branch of the Southern Pacific Railroad,
four days ago. That route was chosen as
the favored one for railway leading from
San Francisco Bay to the Columbia River.
/ say that dwellers near the coast can
hardly come to believe that in the upper
valley of the Sacramento, in the neighbor
ing county of Siskiyou, fifteen feet of snow
on a level was recorded at this season of
the year. True, the snowfall is stated to
have been an unprecedented one in the
history of the county, yet the annual rec
ord of land and snow slides along the line
of that road between Redding and Siskiyou
Mountain has been prompt and contin
uous since the road was first operated.
81 have been wondering why the first
railroad projected between Portland and
San Francisco was assigned to a route
along which such desperate existing and
prospective obstacles required to be over
come. Storm harbingers came to the val
leys as well as the mountains of California
fully two months ago, and the weather
record shows that for almost two months
been unparalleled in the past.
81 do not hesitate to express the belief,
based on actual and acquired knowledge
gained during a residence of twenty-five
years, that at no point between Yaquina
Bay and Sausalito on the line of coast
route affording the most natural and feasi-
BILE route for a railroad survey has snow
fallen to a depth OF five inches since the
commencement of the present winter.
This assertion is certainly applicable so
far as Mendocino, Humboldt and Del Norte
counties are concerned, and there is no
hazard IN saying it viii apply to the
stretch of coast country from the State
line to Yaquina Bay or the mouth of the
Columbia.
81 venture the opinion that the expense
incurred in clearing snowdrifts or level
snow on the Mount Shasta division of the
California and Oregon road and the loss
consequent to hindrance and delay during
the month of January amounted to a
greater sum than would be required to
bridge all the streams encountered on the
line of an ocean-shore railway extending
from Yaquina Bay in Oregon to Sausalito.
Delays are expensive as well as dangerous,
and blockaded traffic is as great bill of
expense as the snowplow service in a sus-
pension of operations which continues
through period of ten days.
Sooner or later a transcontinental rail-
way must enter San Francisco by this
ocean-shore route. The Umpqua, Rogue,
Klamath, Mad, Eel, Noyo and Russian
rivers would be more formidable obstacles
in the building OF such a road than would
be encountered in preparing. the roadway
between the two extreme points mentioned.
If there is anything in advantage it is
entirely in favor OF the coast over the in
land route. Timber, farming, dairying,
wool and fruit growing are the munitions
of commerce which would be encountered
throughout its entire length. From the
roadway an almost continuous view of the
Pacific would be affordeClfor i distance of
more than 400 miles. The meanderings of
the road would be through diversity of
gorgeous and pastoral scenery only euualed
in the passage of the Rocky Mountains.
"To those who are unfamiliar with the
redwood region Of the north coast it may
be well to explain that although a strip of
territory ten to thirty miles in width from
the shore line is now numbered with
dense growth of timber, this same land,
when denuded of the timber affords the
best and most profitable opportunity for
dairying and fruit-growing. The strip ex-
tends from Russian River, through Mendo-
cino, Humboldt and Del Norte counties
almost to the Oregon line, and already
hundreds of acres have been utilized for
these purposes, producing the most pro-
life growths of grass and clover and the
very finest fruits of either early or late
varieties.
"Along. the line of this imaginary coast
railway are scores of shipping points,
Eureka being most prominent in the list.
Trinidad, an hours steaming north from
Eureka, has capacious harbor, with suffi-
cient depth of water to afford safe anchor
age for vessels of the largest class during
great portion of the year.
"Along the stretch of coast refe rred to
abundant opportunities are afforded for
diyerging inland branches of the main
line, reaching to the pine forests, agricul-
tural and grazing districts. Enough of
these opportunities offer to afford profit
able feeders to a coast-line railway, which
cannot be reached at advantage from an
inland line One of the most important of
these would be afforded by the con-
templated extension of the Eel River and
Eureka Railroad through the Van Duzen
Valley and the Pacific Lumber Company's s
road connecting Herewith at Alton. be-
ieye that the building of this ocean-shore
railway would result in the construction OF
road from Grants Pass in Oregon to
Crescent City and of the contemplated
road from Fort Bragg on the Mendocino
coast to Willis and Round Valley.
"There are three things which those COM
mercially interested in the welfare of San
Francisco, and who clamor for a competing
transcontinental line of travel, should take
into account. First, that no such natural
obstacles as are encountered on the inland
route exist on the coast one. Second, that