The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-10-01
WHERE 1T WILL RUN TO
A QUESTION THAT rs YET TO BE
DECIDED.
SEVERAL ROUTES WILL BE SURVEYED
And Estimates of Each Made and The Advan
tages of Each Carefully Weighed. VIII.
son ard Springhope Both
After the Road

Mr.. L. NJ L. McKennan. civil en-
gineer of Chase City, Va, arrived here
yesterday morning and will tomorrow
begin the preliminary work for the
surveyor the Raleigh and Eastern Rail
way, which enterprise is backed by
leading Raleigh and Durham capitalists.
The plan Mr.. Mckennan will fol-
low will be to ride over all the coun-
try along the several routes that the
road may follow and locate roughly the
course for each one. Then surveys of
these routes will lie made and the es-
Inmates of building them cast up and
submitted to the promoters and hackers
OF the road When this has been done
the capitalists behind it can carefully
balance cost and advantages, see what
the people along the lines of survey are
disposed to do and select the one that
seems, all things considered, most adj
yantageous.
There is no lack of people and towns
after the projected road. Wakefield
and Spring Hope want it and point out
that it will cut through fine farming
and timber section if it goes that way,
Hope, it will shorten the distance be-
tween Norfolk and Raleigh at least
one hour and can depend upon a heavy
traffic with that port. From Raleigh to
Spring Hope where the road would
tap the Coast Line is 30 miles. Then
if the road should get more ambitious it
could push on to tidewater, Green
vile or elsewhere, only matter of So
lbs nt11 ,l..;.. "a
get its freight nearly half way down
from present figures. This also is food
for thought.
Wilson wants the road and badly.
The capitalists interested have receiv-
ed over 300 letters from citizens and
business men of Wilson offering all
sorts of inducements TO the road if it
will go there-fnancial help, and
freight galore. Wilson Ships nearly a
score of million pounds OF tobacco ev-
cry year ond this has been largely
promised the new road if it will go
after it, 1t is 4S miles TO Wilson,
The Seaboard, it is asserted, says to the
newcomer, Go TO Wilson, the Coast
Line says, go to Wilson and we will
build from Spring Hope inro Raleigh
and the new road says nothing, but
20 PiSpdiiHS ~ Oll lIItt VI IOuI
routes. And so the matter stands.
Another matter of moment in this
connection is the fact that spectators
have rushed in and have taken options
on all the desirable timber lands along
one of the supposedly lTobable routes
On another they have not. All these are
things to be weighed
Mr.. McKennan, who will have
charge of the surveys, is an old hand
at the business and has worked in
nearly every State of the Union. He
has a letter from Thomas Scott, then
president of the Pennsylvania Railroad,
written in 1873 and praising his work.
lie has in turn surveyed for the
Union Pacific, the Denver, Rio Grande
and Northern, the Oregon Short Line
and dozens of other roads, East and
West. Among Mr. Mckennan's ex-
periences in rairoading has been a
fight with tie Union Pacific for the pos
session of canyon in Utah and the
consequent necessity of sleeping under
the cedars for a whole winter and driy
ing his stakes in snow waistdleep.
His only work in this State previously
was the survey for the Durham and
Keysville, which was stopped by the
panic of 1873. Mr.. McKennan will.
of course, make his headquarters here.
while making the survey for the Raleigh
and Eastern