Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 38, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 December 1905 — THE RAILROADS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE RAILROADS

Corrected engineering data of the complete surveys of the Western Pacific railroad are available. Plans are under way to shorten the route of th Baltimore and Ohio road between Chicago and Baltimore 100 miles. According to estimates of operating officials of the Panhandle road the cost of improvements contemplated for next year will be about $5,000,000. • Preparations are being made by the Illinois roads affected by the order of the State Railroad and Warehouse Commissioners for horizontal reduction of 20 per cent in official freight rates now in effect, to oppose the order on the ground that it is unfair and unjust to the railroads and an extreme case of discrimination, which will damage the railroad business in the State. The hearing of the case of the Pine Island Farmers’ Elevator Company of Pine Island, Minn., against the Chicago Great Western railway, involving alleged discrimination in the matter of freight rates on grain, is to be held in St. Paul. A solid through train from Chicago to Los Angeles has been placed in service over the Chicago, Union Pacific and Northwestern line and the newly opened Salt Dike route. The train is electric lighted throughout. The schedule time of the new train is sixty-eight hours. Sixty of the most powerful and modern locomotives ever constructed are now being received by the Illinois Central railroad for service on the Chicago-St. i*aul fc Chicago-Omaha and Chicago-New Orleans lines. The engines are GO in number, 50 being about equally divided between the passenger and freight departments and 10 for the switching service. The passenger engines are of the Pacific type and are beauties. They weigh 225,000 pounds, have a capacity of 7,000 gallons of water and 15 thns of coal, and their driving wheels are 7 feet 3 inches in diameter. They are guaranteed to cover 75 to 90 miles an hour. The Boston and Maine railroad was authorized by the Railroad Commissioners of the State of Massachusetts to issue $10,000,000 twenty-year 4 per cent bonds. The issue is to refund expiriug bonds which include $7,724,500 G per cent Eastern railway certificates of indebtedness; $2,000,000 5 per cent Central Massachusetts bonds and $594,000 G per cent Eastern railroad mortgage bonds. „ Commissioners of the District of Columbia will ask Congress for the establishment of a juvenile court.