Evening star., 1907-09-01


across Salt Lake, it was not nearly costly,
ured by the amount of time saved, some other
railroad enterprises. 1t stands however the
greatest time saving undertaking of the century
1t Topped off two hours in the trip from the East
San Francisco, saving one hundred and twenty
minutes for each train. On this basis the bridging
of Salt Lake cost only about thlrty-tlve thousand
dollars minute.
Down in New Mexico
nOWN in New Mexico there is another time saving
- engineering feat. 1t is the Santa Fe road and
is known the Belen cutoff. Near Rio Puerco
the trains had to climb grade of one hundred and
eighty-fve feet to the mile. A modern locomotive
with the small old fashioned caches freight
could climb such steep grade; but cars have in
creased in size almost as fast as the locomotives
and to haul modern train across the high grade
several of the most powerful locomotives had to
puff and struggle away at a great expenditure OF
fuel and time. The cutoff shortens the
and reduces the climb from over seventy-fve hun
dred to two thousand feet. The time saved in the
miles of track is about twenty minutes.
The total cost is ten million dollars At another
place on the Santa Fe many more millions are beng
spent in tunneling the Baton range; and the South
Pacific, not satisfied with bridging Salt Lake, is
preparing to tunnel the Sierra Nevada Mountains
at estimated cost of over five million dollars
Tunnels the most expensive undertakings
for shortening distances and saving time but
next come mammoth bridges. The early railroads
crossed streams on inferior wooded bridges and
stiltlike treste work These bridges rapidly
being replaced by steel structures. In the
last ten years the Pennsylvania has spent upward Of
fifteen million dollars them, and the Wabash
has expended even more in the last five years. The
largest concrete bridge in the world constructed
by railroad. 1t crosses the Santa Ana River near
Riverside, California, the Salt Lake route from
San Pedro to Salt Lake. The bridge is sixty feet
high and one thousand feet long, and contains
thirteen thousand cubic yards of concrete.
The longest bridge in the world was built to short
en- time by a railroad. 1t IS the famous twelve
mile bridge trestles of the Lucin cutoff across
Salt Lake. 1t about thirty-two miles across
the lake, and after twenty miles of it was filled
with rock, stone, and sand the rest of the distance
was brldged by a great treste.
Some Great Bridges
THE great bridges crossing the East River, New
York, are the most costly in the world, and were
constructed by the CITY to save time rapid transit
but stupendous and costly than any of these
will be the proposed bridges the Hudson,
connecting the metropolis with New Jersey. One
of these, at 59th-st, extending across to New
Jersey will cost seventy-fve million dollars, in
cludng the approaches The total length of the
structure will be wenty-seven hundred and thirty
feet, and its width one hundred feet 1t will have
ways for passenger trains, vehicles, and foot pas
sengers. The other bridge will cross at 3d-st.
the Hudson County boulevard, New Jersey, with
total length of span and approaches of six thousand
feet. 1t will be one hundred and fifty feet above
the river, and will cost between fifty million and
seventy million dollars.
These two structures will surpass anything in
the world in cost and engineering difficulty of
construction. They will eliminate several minutes
from the present time required for commuters to
reach the city from their suburban homes The
time for shipping freight from the West to the
city will also be reduced.
Father Time is thus being steadily VanquiShed
by the railroads. minute saved on a train means,
road operating hundred and twenty trains a
day, just two hours out of every tWenty-four,
seven hundred and thirty hours year, which is
actual value of hour to transportation companies,
may get faint idea of why each minute saved