The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-08-30

At Dale and Minnehaha streets a
plant is rapidly nearing completion
which will bring to st. Paul several
hundred skilled laborers and their fam
lilies, and which, when in operation,
will be the medium for the distribution
of from $1,250,000 to $1,5G0,000 annually
in wages alone.
The new Great Northern locomotive
repair shops at Dale street will be
ready for operation about Dec. l.
When they are opened, in conjunction
with the shops at Jackson street, st.
Paul will have one of the three great
est car and locomotive repair shops on
the American continent. In point of
equipment these shops will be the
peers of the best in the world if not
the leaders.
The first general interest attaching
to the new shops are the benefits to
st. Paul as a city that will accrue
from the splendid Improvement The
present shops at Jackson street give
employment to about 500 men. When
the new. shops are opened this number
will be increased to from 1,400 to 1900
men. The great majority of these men
are skilled laborers, earning wages
which make the grand average about
| So per day, or an aggregate, when the
new shops are opened, of from $780,
One of the most significant features
of this immense addition to the Great
Northern equipment is that the addi-
ton to the working forces will be All
addition to the city's population of
from 5000 to 5000, and 100000 to
$750,000 annually to the revenue of st.
Paul business men.
1t means that a large number of new
houses must be erected, and in conse-
a obi "a 70 INN ant n
the Como avenue district; new and
profitable investment for money now
lying idle or earning small rates of in
terest and substantial additions to the
tax revenue of the city.
A majority of the men who will come
to st. Paul for employment in the new
shops will come to remain. They have
families and will at once become per-
manent and desirable factors in the
city's industrial life. Their incomes
will be steady. Their money will be
spent in st. Paul for every day neces-
sites of life and the improvement of
homes. While it is entirely probable
that many of these men and their fam
| lilies will find homes in different sec
tions of the city, majority of them
will desire homes near the shops. This
must result in the rapid development
of the district between Dale street and
Hamline, which, while it offers one of
the most desirable home locations in
the city, has been neglected.
The opening of the new shops in ST.
Paul does not mean that the Great
Northern company is to close or aban-
don its other shops. The new shops
are simply an addition to the roads
equipment, made necessary by the
| rapid growth of its business and roll
ing stock. That the present improve
ment will be adequate for only a COM
paratively few years is conceded, and
other additions on the same scale will
have to be made before the shops not
yet opened are old.
As an illustration in point: The new
shops, doubling the capacity of the
present shops at Jackson street, will
be devoted entirely to the repair of
now serve as the principal shops for
the repair of both locomotives and
cars. will be devoted wholly to car re-
pairs.
At the new shops all the mechanical
supplies used on the system will be
handled or accounted for-an item
which in itself is an industry and in
volving the expenditure of an i'm
mense amount of money, exclusive of
wages.
The Improvement at Dale and Min
nehaha streets involves more than the
splendid picture of industrial wealth
presented to the eye. The thirty-acre
tract, seven acres of which are covered
with great brick buildings, trayersed
fby dozens of tracks, bearing snorting
Iengines and loaded cars, was three
I years ago swamp. returning little or
no taxes to the state or city and
breeding malaria. Now it is a center
which viii compel the substantial i'm
proyement of a large portion of the
city's unimproved realty, and will be
soon a source of revenue to all of the
/ city's commercial interests.
| The retaining of the land and erec-
| ton and equipment of the plant rep
resents an expenditure of something
more than $1,000,000. Outside Of the
/ machinery purchases, this money has
J been spent in St. Paul and found Its