The Daily Alaska empire., 1927-10-27
THEN. AND NOW.

Recently Daa!al Willard of the foremost railroad executives in the country, expressed the view that should all the railroads in the United States be consolidated into small number of great systems the public would get better ce at lower cost than is possible There at present several hundred individual roads with approximately 275OO0 miles of main line track These, MT Willard suggested, consolidated under the provisions of the Transportation Act of 1920 into 25 large systems comparable to the Penn sylvana and New York Central in the east and Sante Fe and Southern Pacific in the west would not only promote efficiency in operation and resultant improvement in service randered but also in material reduction in the charges necessary in order to reasonable returns the money invested and required to keep in operation the many systems involved.
 That was the idea apparently. behind the consolidation plans of the late E. IL Iiaeflmail who made the Union Pacific the great systr it is today and who early in this century extended it's influence o the Southern Pacific rebuilt the Central Pacific to tap the California field and secured control over the Oregon Short Line to get direct northern connection with the Pacilc Northwest and Coast This done, he dreamed of linking up through the Burlington with the md de and southwestern States vaster trana portation empire His movements to this end led to the famous fight with James j. Hill and the elder J. P. Morgan, almost permitting him to absorb tlf Great Northern system and did result in compromise agreement with his famous rivals by which the Union Pacific given influence in the rival line through holding corporation This agreement was attacked by the Government and the holding corporation dissolved by the courts.
 Harriman's methods of procedure were differ ent from those in vogue today though the ends sought largely similar Consolidation then as meant efficiency. lower costs, greater service It. naturally, makes possible the opera tion of non-prohtable branches still in the deve- opment stages because the drain be absorbed by the parent system. Harriman however, was ahead of time He dealing in railroads still regarded as private institutions The concept of them public service corporations was still to be developed.
 Less than 20 years after his great dream of consolidating the Union Pacific and Great North ern systems was disspated policy largely the same in effect legally recognized and written into the Federal Transportation Act. the law under which MT. Willard says it is now pos sible to consolidate all of the nations rail prop critics into a few large systems. There are no striking evidences that the public would feel any alarm over such combinations. Perhaps the real reason lies to some extent in Mir Wards state ment that since January l. than $100,- 900, ,0O0 of new capital stock has been sold by the steam railroads not including other issues proposed but not yet consummated Where twenty years ago there dozens of stock holders in railroad securities there are today thousands The public is investing more heavily in them each succeeding year and what in liar rimans day of concern to a few has become matter of financial moment to many.
 Public confidence is largely restored in its railroads. Demands for service are higher than ever and to enable them to meet those demands, the public is willing to accept almost any policy that is commensurate with sound financing and the general welfare of the nation as a whole