Arizona republican., 1904-04-25
RUSSIAN RAILWAYS
Relation to the COuntry'S s
 Commerce
The Trans-Siberian Line and Other Railways, the Arteries of the Great Empire.


 thur by the Russian trans-Siberian railway and the Russian. lines in Man churia is 59l3 miles, or practically twice the distance from New York to San Francisco. Ilis is one of the nu- merous interesting facts about Russia and her railway and commercial sys- tems presented in a monograph just issued by the department of commerce and labor through its bureau of sta- tistics, entitled commercial Russia in { 1904" The publication, which occu- pies more than 100 large pages, dis | cusses in detail present commercial and ! financial conditions in Russia and oth- CT subjects closely allied herewith. Area, popula ten, railways, water | transportation, methods of communi- ! cation, agriculture, manufactures, | commerce, and many other subjects of l this character are among those dis ; cussed. Agricultural conditions, and ! especially Russia as a rival of the Uni ted States in wheat production; min ; ing conditions, and especially Russia | as a rival of the United States in min | eral oil productions; manufacturing conditions, and Russia as possible | competitor of the United States in the markets Of the Orient for manufac- 1 lures are discussed in detail.
 Regarding the railways, which are subject of especial interest at the pres ent time. in view of present conditions in Russia and the Orient, the report says The importance of railways as means of communication Is now greater than that of the rivers and other water routes, as is shown by Accompanying ' ., l.1- sr-rs-.
 with the exception of the St Peters burg-W g-Warsaw-Vienna, built during the years 1S45-1SzS and 1S53-1S62, respec- lively. and the St. Petersburg-B Moscow ! (Nicholas line), constructed between 1 1943 and 1851, date back to the decade between 1860 and 1870. These years witnessed the construction of the en- 1 tire group of railways. with Moscow | as their common starting point, viz: ] Moscow Nil -NovgorCd (1S61-1S62) ] Moscow VOronezh GS62-1S69), Moscow ] Volodga Qs62-1S72). Moscow -Kharkov | QS66-1S69), with it's branch to Kief i 0S6S-1S70), and Moscow Warsaw (1s66- | 1S7D. Next in point Of time comes the | construction of roads connecting the ] black-soil region with it's natural out ! lets, the ports of the Baltic and Black 1 seas; Riga-Tsaritsyn 1s61-1s71). Klef~ l Konigsberg 1S70-1S73), Libau- -Romny 1 GS71-1874), and Samara-V -Viasma (1S66- 1S7D, all of which lead to the Baltic. | Simultaneously lines were built con- meeting each one of the more important southern seapoTts with the agricultural provinces. Chief among them are: The ! Odessa line, with its branch to Yelisa- vetgrad QS6T-1S69), and it's Bessarabian ! branch (1S71-1S7D, Kharkov-Nikolaiev (12GQ-1S-2l rTa Vcronezh-Rostov QS61-1S76), and, fi> nally. Kharkov-SevastopoI 0S69-1S75).
 The Russo Turkish war of 1S7S-79 caused an almost entire suspension of railway building. It was only during the decade beginning with 1880 that
 activity in this field was again resum- ed. but the character and method of construction of the newly built-roads changed abruptly. Tn place of the for mer trunk lines, connecting either the
 black-sOil area with the seaboards of
 the Baltic, Azov and Black seas, or
 with the central industrial region around Moscow, these years witnessed
 the construction of great strategic rail- roads, such as the trans Caspian the
 Polessie system, besides roads primar- fly destined for the service of relatively
 small though important industrial re-
 gions (Catherine line, Ivangorod- Dom
 brovo). Moreover. the system of grant
 ing franchises (concessions) was sup
 erseded by the building and working of
 roads directly by and on account of the
 state. At the same time the redemp-
 tion by the government of great rail-
 way systems was going on, so that for
 some time it seemed as if all private
 roads were going to be acquired by the state. Although of late greater lati-
 tude has been given to private initia .
 tive, by far the greater part of Rus
 sian railways is in the hands of the . government. Out of 36673 miles under the control of the ministry of commu- nication on Jan. 1, 1904, A, 436 are work
 ed by the state, and 12,237 miles only
 by private companies.
 The adverse years, 1891 and 1892. gave
 a new impetus to railway "In order
 to give employment to the starving
 peasantry," the government undertook
 and encouraged the construction of
 new roads. A new era of railway
 building began with these years : which, in its vigor, soon surpassed anything seen not only in Russia it. | self but anywhere else in Europe Thus, while during the above years the
 number of versts opened for traffic was
 but 123 and 41p respectively, the sue
 ceeding years mark the beginning ot
 an exceedingly energetic expansion ot
 the railway system, whose termia tior I does not seem to be at hand even ir
 the near future. According to officia : figures ther" were opened for traffic
 during the year:
 1893. 1,O43; 1894, 1.147; 1895, 1,277; 1896
 1853; 1897, 1.19n; 1898, 1,S97 1899, S,297,
 19GO. 1,647; 1901, 2,235
 These figures include roads built not
 only by the state, which has it's hands . full with the construction of the grand !. trans Siberian railway. but also by
 corporations whose activity now al . most surpasses that of the early year.
 of the decade beginning with 1870. tn. first period of great railway construc- , tion, when the building Of roads, fol
 some time at least, became the mo. nopoly of a few private companies
 At present franchises are eagerly con. ,- tested by competing corporations, 6 fact unheard of until recently in Rus