Perth Amboy evening news., 1911-04-08

CONTINUED from page u
nal. the boatmen charge, is the same
policy that has been adopted by the
railroads elsewhere in wiping out wa
ter competition with the railroads.
Advocates of the Donnelly bill,
which is offered as a way to restore
water transportation between New York
and Philadelphia, point out that while
New York is spending many millions
in building a barge canal to connect
the lakes and the ocean,, the smaller
canals throughout the east, which were
important highways of for
hauling coal and other freight in the
past, and which might be important
factors in transportation now, have
been virtually wiped out.
''The Pennsylvania, it is shown by
the reports and maps, of the Schuyl-
kill canal, and other similar waterways
which formerly connected the coalfields
with tidewater, or with other canals
reaching the great inland lakes, have
been closed in whole or part, so that
the coal must be hauled some portion
of the way, at least, by rail. The Del
aware and Hudson canal, in New York,
has been abandoned, and a fight OF
twenty years to secure abandonment
of the Morris canal through the north
ern part of New Jersey is now being
renewed by the railroad interests, after
the Lehigh Valley had successfully put
the ditch out of business as a compet-
Iitor in the coal carrying and other
trade.
State Built Canal.
"The Delaware and Raritan canal
was authorized and its building begun
in 1880. 1t was first projected as a
state enterprise, to be constructed and
operated as a public waterway. PIT
waite interests, even so early, however,
induced the legislature to make a grant
Iof the canal right to a corporation.
The first charter grant was for only
thirty years. Several renewals of this
charter have been made from time to
time. At present the canal is leased by
the Pennsylvania Railroad, under a
confusing and complicated joint stock
ownership and legislative sanction, for
999 years.
"Although it is an open question
whether the charter grant to the Dell-
ware and Raritan Canal Company has
not expired many years ago, and wheth-
er the canal does not now really belong
ITO LDI SGdLe, lue IdllIbtLu lbSoOGS La
been permitted to operate the waterway
without regulation or interference.
"Amoug the prohibitive freight elias
sifcations in effect on the Delaware
and Raritan is a toll. The same rate is
said to be in effect on the Delaware and
Chesapeake canal, less than fourteen
miles long. These rates are not the
rates paid by shippers, but the tolls
the boatmen must pay to the railroads
for the privilege of hauling their load
ed boats through the canal. Whatever
the boatmen got for the work must be
added to these tolls TO make the rate
to shippers.
cit is maintained that the reduction
Of the canal tolls will afford cheaper
rates for shippers along the canal.
cit is also being pointed out with
significance that with the waterways
men and legislatures urging and making
large appropriations for new ship ca
mails, the idea of abandoning any ca
mails or having them made unusable be-
IL of prohibitive tolls Is incon-
sistent.
''As q start toward restoring water
transportation, the waterways men and
canal men suggest the state of New Jer-
sey might do something, without much
difficulty and without any appropria-
rson, ny ruur1ug exrrrrug cunaSs nvan- |
able for the carriage of freight.
High Rates for Towing.
"Besides the high rates charged for
tolls, the boatmen complain that. tho
Pennsylvania Railroad maintains q mo-
nopoly of the team towing through the
Delaware and Raritan, and that boat
owners who use the waterway are
charged high rates for steam towing
at both ends Of the canal.
"Reports of the canal company show
that its revenues have constantly de-
creased and that it has not paid expen-
ses for many years past. The boat
men charge that this falling off in the
revenues has been deliberately forced
blythe railroad, as an excuse for even
tually asking permission to abandon the
canal as a waterway and using it for
other purposes, as the Morris canal has
been made Improbable and ruined by
the same methods. Reduction of the toll
rates, the advocates of the Donnelly
bill assert. would restore ~transporta-
ton ON the canal to IN extent that
would make its operation profitable,
both to the boatmen and the owners
of the waterway, as well as making it
useful and profitable to Shippers.
''To establish a fiat rate of 10 cents
a ton for canal tolls, the boatmen say,
would give the canal a larger business
and larger revenue than it now enjoys,
and would reduce the water rates on
many classes of commodities that could
as well be hauled by water as by rail to
not more than so cents to $I.00 q ton
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