| From the Richmond Examiner |
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| December 17, 1861 |
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| The interruption of the course
of travel by the refusal of cities and towns to allow railroad
connections to be made through their streets, has long been a source of
annoyance, expense and delay to travelers; and produce a heavy tax upon
the produce of the country seeking the markets. Not long ago the
Confederate Government, under the pressing urgency of the war, took the
authority to connect two railroads from opposite sides of each of the
towns of Richmond and Petersburg. The engineers who constructed these
connections adopted the shortest route and laid down their work upon
very inconvenient grades. |
| In Richmond no opposition has
been made to the passage of trains on the track laid through this city;
but the grades and curvations are so abrupt as to produce little
practical benefit. The general travel does not pass over it, and no part
of the produce of the people. Nothing but government transportation is
accommodated by the work, and by no means all of that. |
| In Petersburg the connection
has been constructed in such a manner as to be offensive to the council,
and, we suppose, to the people also; as the city authorities have
forbidden it to be used at all, except for the business of the
Confederate Government. Thus the result has been that about twenty-five
thousand dollars have been expended in the two cities, with no benefit
to the public at large, upon two connections which are, in a great
degree, impracticable even for the purposes of the Confederate
Government itself. In fact, the money has been entirely thrown away. |
| The connections must, of
course, be made in such a manner as to meet the necessities which
dictate them. They must be made upon grades that are not only
practicable but facile. They must be made in such a manner as to avoid
injury and inconvenience to the public, upon routes which will admit the
free and easy passage of trains and their locomotives. |
| A bill is now pending before
the Legislature, granting authority to the railroad companies connected
with the subject, for this purpose. The route which has been selected
through Richmond will not meet with any opposition. It will afford an
easy grade, and passengers and freight will be carried upon it with
comfort and safety. As to Petersburg, the route which was made by the
government engineer has been productive only of delays, accidents and
losses; and the city council, ready to catch at any excuse for giving
business at the expense of the people to the few who own carts, drays
and mules, have forbidden any transportation upon it not belonging to
the government. |
| The result is that, the amount
of transportation greatly exceeding the ability of the aforesaid mules
and drays to haul it, there has been a heavy accumulation of produce and
goods at all the depots; a state of things which plays much into the
hands of the speculators and extortioners who have taken possession of
the markets. The speculators and extortioners reside chiefly in the
cities, the cities through their members of council establish this
blockade upon the transmission of salt, flour, butter, bacon, grain and
other produce; and the people suffer doubly, from the inability to sell
their produce and inability to purchase their supplies, resulting from
the blockade of the railroads. |
| Goods purchased by persons
having contracts to supply the army have been lying in Petersburg two or
three months, and flour and other food, intended for the Southern
cities, are now waiting in this city for an opportunity to go South as
soon as the blockade in Petersburg can be removed. |
| It may be said that the
council of Petersburg may be willing to remove the restriction they have
put upon the city railroad there, during the war. But, how do we know
that we shall not have another war? May not these connections be needed
again when we little think of it? Even leaving out the convenience of
the people in peace, as well as war; still, as a war measure, authority
should be granted for building connections which shall be free from the
control of the kind of persons who direct the action of city councils. |
| The State is a very large
stockholder in all the roads interested in these city connections, and
it is proper that legislation should be had in respect to her interest
especially. The connections can be built for less than forty thousand
dollars in the most permanent manner; the interest on which would be
twenty-four hundred dollars. In the absence of these connections the
cost of maintaining omnibuses and wagons is six thousand dollars a year
in Petersburg and the same in Richmond, all of which should be aid in
the form of dividends upon the stock held in the railroad companies. |
| The break in going through
Petersburg has always been regarded by travelers as the most
objectionable on the whole Southern line of travel. If it be allowed to
continue as heretofore, the city of Petersburg will find her trade and
travel diverted away, and she will cease to be even a way station upon a
great route. The completion of the Danville and Greensbororough
connection {Piedmont RR} will take every
through passenger and pound of through freight by that route, in
preference to one on which they are subjected to such vexatious delay,
inconvenience and taxation, without necessity or excuse. There is
nothing so intolerable to the traveling public than needless delay and
annoyance inflicted for the mere purpose of making a little money off of
them. If a bridge is burnt, they will change cars and take the ferry
most cheerfully; because the case is one of plain necessity. But to be
required to leave a warm car on a cold night, and to ride in chilly and
jolting omnibuses, through cheerless streets, in order that the dray and
mule owners and produce speculators of the town may make money by the
interruption, is what the patience of nobody can endure. |
| The proposition before the
Legislature for permitting the construction of these connections is not
only judicious in regard to economy and public convenience, but it
proposes to discharge a duty which the authorities of the State owe to
her own farmers and to the traveling public. The bill which is now
before the House of Delegates proposes no appropriation out of the
public treasury. It simply gives authority to the railroad companies
designated in it to construct these connections so much needed. We take
it for granted that the bill will be passed almost without a dissenting
voice. |
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