Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 October 1892 — Liverpool Is Doomed. [ARTICLE]

Liverpool Is Doomed.

Liverpool men of business are greatly alarmed by the prospective transfer of the Inman landing place to Southampton by rumors that the Cunard and White Star Lines will also withdraw from Liverpool and by the threatened competition of New Milford and Bristol as British ports of arrival and departure for the transatlantic steampship trade. They complain that the benefits of the transatlantic trade have been hardly realized before the city is threatened with the .loss of them. The conviction spreads that the Mersey Docks Board have done much by their parsimony to injure Liverpool’s prospects in trade. Recently the board proposed that the steamship companies assist them in building in the North Town a deep-water landing stage for the exclusive use of the passengers to and from New York. Most of the companies replied that they could not see why they were called upon to contribute to the execution of the plan, and the matter was dropped. Public opinion, aroused by the prospect of a heavy loss of trade, has now compelled the board to revive the plan in such form that the city., if necessary, will pay the whole expense. The execution of this plan will include the building of a short, railway from the Canada dock station across the dock to a new stage railway connected with the Northwestern main line. It will be hardly possible to begin within a year, as a grant of powers from Parliament will be required. The days of Liverpool as the great transatlantic port of England are numbered. It owes its present preeminence not to the superior facilities of its port, but the enterprise of

Its citizens. The mouth of the Mersey is net a harbor in the proper sense o! ttVe word, and it is only by constant dredging that the bar is made passable by heavy draught steamers. Southampton, from its nearness to London, is much more convenient for transatlantic travelers who Wish to avoid the trip through the Irish Sea. New Milford, where active preparations are on foot for the starting of Lord Dunraven’s projected line, has similar advantages, and with some improvements its finely sheltered harbor can be made one of the finest in England. It is only as the great commercial emporium of Northern England that Liverpool can continue te hold its own.