[CHAPTER XXXII.]
CANAL TRAFFIC: ITS CHARACTER AND ITS DENSITY.
There is a very prevalent impression that railways and canals have each their proper and natural function in the transport of merchandise—the railways in the carrying of goods of considerable intrinsic value, or of a perishable character, in which speed is an element of value; and the canals in conveying heavy merchandise, such as coal, iron ore, pig iron, building stone, timber, and other traffic, of relatively low intrinsic value, and incapable of being deteriorated by delay.
In accordance with this idea, the canal traffic of most European countries has usually taken the form of coal, iron, and other heavy merchandise, while the railways have carried goods that were charged a high rate of freight, on the grounds that they were damageable, and of high intrinsic value.
This, however, is by no means a universal rule. On many waterways, and especially in countries which have limited railway facilities, like Russia, canals are found as well adapted as railways to all purposes of transport. On the canals of the United States, the canals compete with the railways in carrying wheat and other agricultural produce. On the Aire and Calder canal, the canal boats are adapted to carry, and as a matter of fact do carry, considerable quantities of general merchandise, as well as minerals.
The French Government and Chambers, guided by the well-informed engineers of the Ponts et Chaussées, have controverted the idea that there is necessarily any real rivalry between railways and canals. “Each of these two ways of communication,” reported M. de Berigny to the Chamber of Deputies in 1833, “has its distinct and special domain.” “Nothing,” says another French writer, “is to-day more true. Almost everywhere that navigable routes and railways run side by side, the development of industry and commerce has been such that after a brief crisis the traffic of the older line of communication has notably increased. Far from being enemies, railways and canals aid one another in the performance of their natural duties. The former transport passengers, costly merchandise, manufactured products—all that cannot endure long delay. The latter, on the other hand, transport raw materials of small value, for the transport of which speed is of secondary importance, which cannot bear high rates of charge, and which in consequence do not form a remunerative traffic for railways.”[293] “The delay of a week or a fortnight in the delivery of these articles,” reported the Commission named by the Chamber of Deputies in 1878 to examine the project for improving the inland navigation of France, “is a matter of little importance, while the difference of freight for long distances between the lowest rate at which a railway can carry and that which is attainable on a canal is equal to half the price of the goods.” “Coal,” the Commission stated, “cannot be carried on railways, even for long distances, at a less cost than from 0·54d. to 0·62d. per ton per mile, but can be transported by canal for 0·22d. per ton per mile.”
“In France, in Germany, in Belgium, and in England,” says another writer,[294] “the round price of one-third of a penny per ton per mile will pay for transport on canals of adequate section and volume of traffic, and this price includes, not only a fair interest on the capital, but also provision for sinking fund, which within a determinable time will render these inland waterways the property of the nation, to be used free of charge, except the trifling amount necessary for maintenance of the works and attendance on the locks. On a traffic of 600,000 tons per annum this charge does not exceed 0·022d. per ton per mile.” The cost of towing, to be borne by the users of these national waterways, has been found to be as low as from 0·065 to 0·079 per ton per mile for horse towing in Belgium, including the return of empty boats.
There is no record of the traffic that is carried on the canals of the United Kingdom at the present time. On the Birmingham Canal, which has a mileage of 162 miles, and some hundreds of private basins, the tonnage carried in 1887 was not less than 7,000,000 tons. This is an average of about 43,200 tons per mile, and if the whole of the canals constructed in the United Kingdom had been equally useful and successful, the total quantity of traffic carried on the 3000 miles of canals constructed would have been close on 130,000,000 of tons, or more than one-half of the total tonnage carried on the railways of the United Kingdom in 1887. Of course, however, the Birmingham Canal traffic is altogether exceptional, as is also that of the Bridgwater Canal, and the Aire and Calder Navigations. These three canal systems compete very successfully with the railways for the heavy traffic of the districts through which they pass, and have been able for years to earn large dividends, with comparatively low rates of freight.[295]
There is a widespread belief that railway transport represents a very considerable proportion of the total ultimate cost of the heavy traffic carried in this country. Of some descriptions of heavy traffic this is no doubt true. It is not, however, equally true of mineral traffic. The average receipts earned by the railway companies per ton of minerals transported in 1888, irrespective of distance, was 1·6s. On the great bulk of the coal and iron ore carried, it must have been very much less, seeing that a large quantity of coal—as for example the supply of London, which is alone an item of over seven millions of tons a year—is carried for over a hundred and fifty miles at 6s. to 7s. per ton freight.[296] There is no similar record of traffic for other countries. In the United States the census returns show that in 1880, 89½ millions of tons of coal were carried on all the railways then open. The gross income earned thereby is not, however, separately stated, although it may be possible to arrive approximately at the figure we want by taking the statistics that are given for the group of States of which New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio are the chief. In this group 192 millions of tons were carried in 1880, of which 76 millions of tons were coal. The revenue derived therefrom was 208 millions of dollars, so that the average amount paid to the railways per ton carried was 4·3s., or nearly three times as much as in Great Britain.[297]