Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 February 1887 — Logging Railways. [ARTICLE]

Logging Railways.

Development in the direction of logging railways on the Pacific coast might be taken as an indication that operators in that quarter are making snch a hole in their timber resources as to require longer hauls and the improved facilities which these make essential, in order to keefc their mills supplied with stock. This, however, is not a necessary conclusion. In hauling the large, heavy timber which abounds in the country, there is reason to suppose that a good logging railway would prove more effective and much cheaper than trucks and animal power. When there is business enough to warrant it, logging by rail proves the cheaper method in Michigan and Wisconsin, where they have the advantage of snow roads and sled hauling to help gut on the side of the old way, and it would be strange indeed if the Pacific coast lumbermen could not make it even more economical as compared with any other method open to their use. They are evidently codvinced that they can do so, for the past year has seen more money invested in improvements of this character in the Puget Sound district, in Washington Territory, than has been so employed altogether in times past. And the work still goes on, A recent writer speaks of seven different lumber concerns in that regibii which have such roads already building. Most of them are standard gauge roads, well graded, substantially constructed mt? equipped with first-class motive power and rolling stock. They are roads which are in keeping with the business as it is conducted in that district, and it is not to be doubted that their projectors will find them eminently profitable. The building of them indicates that the lumber makers there are enjoying a measure of prosperity, and that they see ahead the opportunity of selling a good deal of lumber. The fact' of such heavy investments in the*machinery of logging, by the Pacific slope operators, indicates a purpose to cut liberally, which they would not be apt to entertain unless there is warrant in the outlook for an increased production of the mills— The Timberman.