Edwin A. Pratt

“ The Danube is the largest river in Europe in respect of its volume of water; it is the only large European river that flows due east; and it is therefore the great highway to the East for South Germany, for Austria, for Hungary, and for the younger nations in its valley. It flows through more lands, races, and languages than any other European river. The Rhine is the great water-highway for Western Europe; and it carries the traffic and the travellers of many countries and peoples. Both streams give life to the whole Continent; they join many countries and the most varied interests ”

“ If Belgium and Holland, especially, had had no chance of getting more than local, as distinct from through or transit traffic—if, in other words, they had been islands like our own, with the same geographical limitations as ourselves, and with no trans-Continental traffic to handle, is there the slightest probability that they would have spent anything like the same amount of money on the development of their waterways as they have actually done? ”

“ In practice, therefore, the theory that the canals would become self-supporting, as soon as the aforesaid millions had been spent, must inevitably break down, with the result that the burden of the whole enterprise would then necessarily fall upon the community; and why the trader who consigns his goods by rail, or the professional man who has no goods to consign at all, should be taxed to allow of cheaper transport being conferred on the minority of persons or firms likely to use the canals even when resuscitated, is more than I can imagine, or than they, probably, will be able to realise. ”

“ He knew no more business-like concern in the world than the Mersey Harbour Board, which was a credit to the country as showing what business men, not working for their own selfish profits, but for the good of the community, could do for an undertaking. He would be glad to see the Mersey Boards scattered all over the country." But, even accepting the principle of canal municipalisation, what prospect would there be of Colonel Walker's aspiration being realised? The Mersey Harbour Board is an exceptional body, not necessarily capable of widespread reproduction on the same lines of efficiency. ”

“ After all the money that has been spent on the Manchester Ship Canal it is still found necessary to lay out a great deal more on warehouses which are absolutely essential to the full and complete development of the enterprise. The same principle would apply to any scheme of revived inland navigation. The goods depôts constructed by railway companies in all large towns and industrial centres have alone sufficed to bring about a complete revolution in trade and commerce since the days when canals were prosperous. ”

“ And, if ready in principle, if ready to employ public funds to compete with representatives of the private enterprise it has hitherto encouraged, is it still certain that, when millions of pounds sterling have been spent on the revival of our canals, the actual results will in any way justify the heavy expenditure? ”

“ Under the best possible conditions as regards municipalisation, it is still impossible to assume that a business so full of complications as the transport services of the country, calling for technical or expert knowledge of the most pronounced type, could be efficiently controlled by individuals who would be essentially amateurs at the business—and amateurs they would still be even if assisted by members of Chambers of Commerce who, however competent as merchants and manufacturers, would not necessarily be thoroughly versed in all these traffic problems. ”

“ Business has been simplified, subdivided, and brought within the reach of "small" men to an extent that, but for the railway, would have been impossible; and it is difficult to imagine that traders in general will forego all these advantages now, and revert once more to the canal boat, merely for the sake of a saving in freight which, in the long run, might be no saving at all. ”

“ Taking geographical considerations first, a glance at the map of Europe will show that, apart from their national requirements, enterprises, and facilities, Germany, Belgium, and Holland are the gateways to vast expanses producing, or receiving, very large quantities of merchandise and raw materials, much of which is eminently suitable for water transport on long journeys that have absolutely no parallel in this country. ”

“ Reviewing—even thus inadequately—the work that had been already done, one ceases to wonder that, when the railways began to establish themselves in this country, the canal companies of that day regarded with despair the idea of practically doing the greater part of their work over again, in order to carry on an apparently hopeless struggle with a powerful competitor who had evidently come not only to stay but to win. ”

“ The paramount and ever-increasing importance attached by the vast majority of British traders to quick delivery (an importance so great that on some lines there are express goods trains capable of running from 40 to 60 miles an hour) will keep them to the greater efficiency of the railway as a carrier of goods; while, if a serious diversion of traffic were really threatened, the British railways would not be handicapped as those of France and Germany are in any resort to rates and charges which would allow of a fair competition with the waterways. ”

“ The railway truck is not only (once more) a better unit in regard to quantity, but, as in the case of domestic coal, it can go to any railway station, and can often be brought miles nearer to the actual destination than if the articles or materials in question are forwarded by water; while the addition to the canal toll of the cost of cartage at either end, or both, may swell the total to the full amount of the railway rate, or leave so small a margin that conveyance by rail, in view of the other advantages offered, is naturally preferred. ”

“ For trades and businesses conducted on these lines, the railway—taking and delivering promptly consignments great or small, penetrating to every part of the country, and supplemented by its own commodious warehouses, in which goods can be stored as desired by the trader pending delivery or shipment—is a far more convenient mode of transport than the canal boat; and to the railway the perfect revolution that has been brought about in the general trade of this country is mainly due. ”

“ The Mississippi and its various tributaries drain, altogether, an area of 1,240,000 square miles, or nearly one-third of the territory of the United States. If any great river in the world had a chance at all of holding its own against the railroads as a highway of traffic it should, surely, be the Mississippi, to which British theorists ought to be able to point as a powerful argument in support of their general proposition concerning the advantages of water over rail-transport. ”

“ As a young man disappointed in love, he applied himself to business in a manner so eminently practical that he deservedly became famous as a pioneer of improved transport. He saw that if only the cost of carriage could be reduced, a most valuable market for coal from his Worsley mines could be opened up in Manchester. ”

“ Individuals of this type, though admitting they would not use the canals themselves, or very little, would have us believe that there are enough of other traders who would patronise them to make them pay. In any case, if only sufficient pressure could be brought to bear on the railway companies to force them to reduce their rates and charges, they would be prepared to regard with perfect equanimity the unremunerative outlay on the canals of a large sum of public money, and be quite indifferent as to who might have to bear the loss so long as they gained what they wanted for themselves. ”

“ Not only does the Kennet and Avon deserve to rank as one of the best maintained of any canal in the country, but it still affords all reasonable facilities for such traffic as is available, or seems likely to be offered. Instead of being neglected by the Great Western Railway Company, it is kept in a state of efficiency that could not well be improved upon short of a complete reconstruction, at a very great cost, in the hope of getting an altogether problematical increase of patronage in respect to classes of traffic different from what was contemplated when the canal was originally built. ”

“ Notwithstanding the vast importance to the farmer of having the produce of his farm conveyed in a cheap and expeditious manner to market, it is almost equally essential to him to have a cheap conveyance for manure from a large town to a distant farm; and here the advantages to be derived from a rail-way are abundantly apparent, for by a single loco-motive engine, 50 tons of manure may be conveyed, at a comparatively trifling expense, to any farm within the line of the road. ”

“ Although, therefore, in theory coal would appear to be an ideal commodity for transport by canal, in actual practice it is found that rail transport is both more convenient and more economical, and certainly much better adapted to the exigences of present day trade in general, in the case alike of domestic coal and of coal for shipment. Whether or not the country would be warranted in going to a heavy expense for canal resuscitation for the special benefit of a limited number of traders having works or factories alongside canal banks is a wholly different question. ”

“ Much of this traffic, again, can just as well pass through one Continental country, on its way to or from the coast, as through another. In fact, some of the most productive of German industrial centres are much nearer to Antwerp or Rotterdam than they are to Hamburg or Bremen. Hence the extremely keen rivalry between Continental countries having ports on the North Sea for the capture of these great volumes of trans-Continental traffic, and hence, also, their low transport rates, and, to a certain extent, their large expenditure on waterways. ”

“ Every one must sympathise with him in that desire, and there is no need whatever for me to stay here to repeat the oft-expressed general reflections as to the important part which cheap transit necessarily plays in the development of trade and commerce. But when from the general one passes to the particular, and begins to consider how these transit questions apply directly to canal revival, one comes at once to a certain element of insincerity in the agitation which has arisen. ”

“ As to those persons who speculate on making rail-ways general throughout the kingdom, and superseding all the canals, all the waggons, mail and stage-coaches, post-chaises, and, in short, every other mode of conveyance by land and water, we deem them and their visionary schemes unworthy of notice. ”

“ In neither country is there free competition between rail and water transport. If there were, the railways would probably secure a much greater proportion of the traffic than they do. Still another consideration to be borne in mind is that although each country has spent great sums of money—at the cost of the general taxpayer—on the provision of canals or the improvement of waterways, no tolls are, with few exceptions, imposed on the traders. ”

“ The railroad can expand right and left, and reach industries by side tracks; with canals every manufacturer must locate on the banks of the canal. Canals for internal commerce, in my mind, are out of date; they belong to the 'slow.' Nor do I believe [117] that the traffic management of canals by the State has the same conception of traffic measures which is adopted by the modern managers of railroads.
"Canals affect rates on heavy commodities, and play a part mostly injurious, to my mind, to the proper development of railroads, especially on the Continent of Europe. ”

“ Great Britain is almost the only country in the world where the railway system has been constructed without State or municipal aid—financial or material—of any kind whatever. The canals were built by "private enterprise," and the railways which followed were constructed on the same basis. This was recognised as the national policy, and private investors were allowed to put their money into British railways, throughout successive decades, in the belief and expectation that the same principle would be continued. ”

“ Merchants, manufacturers, and builders are no more anxious than the average shopkeeper to keep on hand stocks unnecessarily large, and to have so much money lying idle. They calculate the length of time that will be required to get in more supplies when likely to be wanted, and they work their business accordingly.
From this point of view the railway is far superior to the canal in two respects, at least. ”

“ Any attempt at a general revival and improvement of the canal system throughout England cannot prove financially successful, as local canals, through thinly populated agricultural districts, could not compete with railways. These routes alone should be selected for enlargement of waterway which lead direct from the sea to large and increasing towns like the proposed canal from the Bristol Channel to Birmingham, or which, like the Aire and Calder Navigation and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, are suitably set for the conveyance of coal and general bulky goods to populous districts. ”

“ Nothing could be more delusive than the assertion so frequently made, which is found in the opening pages of the report of the New York Committee on Canals of 1899, that water transportation is inherently cheaper than rail transportation. ”