The Cordova daily times., 1920-10-12
First Division Man Says Gov ernment Track and Road bed in Better Condition Than Average Road.
ROAD ALREADY DOES
 BIG AMOUNT BUSINESS
Belief Expressed It Will Be } On Paying Basis In Very
 Short Time

A resident of the first division, who has been all over this end of the government railway-from Sew ard to Talkeetna and over the branch from Matanuska to Chicka- loon-in speaking to an Anchorage Times representative. had this to say:
 q was really astonished at the class of work that has been done on the nearly three hundred miles of railway that I have be been over in the past two weeks One would naturally expect to find road in a construction condition, but on the other hand every bit of the line from Mile Fl to Talkeetna: from Seward to the summit and the coal branch is in better conditiOn-much better condition, as to the track and roadbed, than the average railway in the states that has been in oper ation for years. I was also aston, ished at the seemingly large busi
 
 ness being done on the railway out side of that necessarily due to con- struction. There seems to be a whole lot of people travelling other than railway employees, and I noticed at every step that there was consid able freight and express loaded and unloaded."
 When asked what he thought of when completed, the same party had this to say: Why I believe that the completed government railway will get on paying basis quicker than has any other western rail way In saying this one has to take into consideration that need of transportation of the country that is being tapped. As we all know most of the western railways are parallel lines: in many instances one may see one railway from the trains of it's competitor And then again I do believe there is a big stretch of country in the west that has as much potential tonnage as has the line from Anchorage to Fair banks with the coal branch. The big solid foundation of every coun- try is agriculture and any one who has visited the Tanana and Matan- uska valleys, even in this, an off farming year, must be firmly con- vinced of Alaskas great farming possibilities. Then again, think of the great good that the road will accomplish as a distributor of mail. Commencing this winter, the whole interior as well as the Nome dis trict will get mail over the rail constructed along the west side of the inlet to connect with Iliamna, all of western Alaska should and would get it's winter mail over the government railway.
 "One must remember that Alaska is truly the last frontier and it will be only a year or so until this country will be getting the home seeker stampedes that filled up the western states so quickly. Regard less of the much-mooted question of government or private railway building any honest person must ad- init that this government project is so far and in all probabilities will continue to be the biggest kind xf a success and steps should be taken by all Alaskans with the real interests of the territory at heart to see that the splendid organiza- tion that has been built up by the Alaskan engineering commission should continue in the railway con- struction business until Alaska has a small portion at least of the rail ways it needs for it's development.
 There should be north and south line built to the westward and if an oil field is found in the Cold bay section as it now looks more than possible, demand may be made for such a road in the i'm mediate future.