RUNNING THE RAILROADS
During the first nine months of our participation in the war the
railroads did their best to meet the unusual and mounting demands
upon their facilities and methods. But the entire railroad system had
developed under the principle of competition and, composed as it was
of so many diverse parts and divergent interests, all accustomed by
theory, tradition and practice to competitive methods, it presently
became evident that the coördinated management and coöperative effort
demanded by the emergency would be impossible under continued private
control. The immense increase in traffic caused by war conditions had
strained the existing system to its utmost effort, and had resulted
by the autumn of 1917 in hopeless congestion of freight at eastern
terminals and along the railway lines far inland. There had been such
rapid increase in operating expenses that the financial situation of
the railroads was very bad, and, under the general financial conditions
of the time, had become a serious menace. The country was at war and
its first and most pressing duty was to prosecute that war to early and
complete victory, which it could not do under the paralysis that was
threatening the transportation system.
For the Government to take control of the railroads was an almost
revolutionary procedure, so opposed was it to American economic theory,
conviction and practice. But the problem was rapidly being reduced to
the bare alternatives of governmental railroad control or the losing of
the war, or, at least, its long-drawn out continuance. But one solution
was possible, and, disregarding all theory and all deeply rooted
custom, the President, in accordance with powers already conferred upon
him by Congress, took possession and assumed control of the entire
railroad system of the United States at the end of December, 1917.
Management of transportation by rail and water was thereupon put into
the hands of a Director General of Railroads, who thus found himself at
the head of more than 265,000 miles of railway, many times the mileage
of any other nation, and of 2,300,000 employees. There were about 180
separate operating companies having operating revenues of $1,000,000 or
more per year each and several hundred more with less than that yearly
revenue. The Railroad Administration, which decentralized its work by
dividing the country into districts, each under a regional director,
began its task in the face of weather conditions without parallel
in the history of the country, which had already almost paralyzed
transportation and were to continue for ten weeks longer.
There was a shortage of freight cars and of locomotives and the
railroads, in common with all the country, were menaced with a shortage
of coal, due mainly to the immensely increased demand and the breakdown
of transportation. So great was the congestion of freight that in the
area north of the Potomac and Ohio Rivers and east of Chicago and the
Mississippi there were 62,000 carloads waiting to be sent to their
destination, while along the lines west and south of that area there
were over 85,000 more carloads held back by this congestion. Nearly all
of it was destined for the eastern seaboard north of Baltimore.
In addition to the usual transportation business of the country,
hundreds of thousands, mounting into the millions, of soldiers had
to be carried from their homes to cantonments and from cantonments
to ports of debarkation and billions of tons of munitions, food,
supplies and materials of many kinds had to be carried from all parts
of the country upon lines that converged toward eastern ports, while
the immense war building program of the nation--cantonments, camps,
munition plants, shipyards and ships, warehouses, structures of many
sorts--called for the transportation of vast quantities of material.
By the first of the following May practically all of this congestion
had been cleared up and through the rest of the year there was no more
transportation stringency, although traffic grew constantly heavier
until the end of hostilities. It will illumine the conditions under
which the Railroad Administration achieved its results to mention a
few of its items of transportation. During the ten months ending with
October it handled 740,000 more cars of bituminous coal than had been
loaded during the same period of the previous year. From the Pacific
Northwest there were brought, from April to November, for the building
of airplanes, ships and other governmental activities and for shipment
overseas, 150,000 cars of lumber. During the year 630,000 cars of grain
were carried to their destination, the increase from July to November
over the previous year being 135,000 cars. Livestock movement was
especially heavy, showing in all kinds a large increase. Five hundred
and sixty thousand carloads of material were moved to encampments,
shipyards and other Government projects. From the middle of May to
the end of the year the car-record office showed a total movement of
1,026,000 cars, an average of 5,700 daily.
Comparison of the physical performance of the roads during the first
ten months of 1918 with that of the similar period in 1917, reduced to
fundamentals, showed an increase in the number of ton-miles per mile of
road per day, in number of tons per loaded car, in number of tons per
freight train mile, in total ton-miles per freight locomotive per day.
The constant purpose was to keep each locomotive and car employed to
its capacity and to make each produce the maximum of ton-miles with the
minimum of train, locomotive and car miles.
Highly important among the achievements of the Railroad Administration
was the movement of troops. From the first of the year until November
10th there were transported over the roads 6,496,000 troops, an average
of 625,000 per month, the troop movements requiring 193,000 cars of
all types, with an average of twelve cars to the train. Outstanding
features of the troop movement were that 1,785,000 men were picked up
from 4,500 separate points and moved on schedule to their training
camps, that 1,900,000 were brought into the crowded port terminals
for embarkation without interference with the heavy traffic of other
kinds already being handled there and in the adjacent territory, that
4,038,000 were carried an average distance of 855 miles, undoubtedly
the largest long distance troop movement ever made. During one period
of thirty days over twenty troop trains were brought each day into the
port of New York. During the entire period from January to November
including these huge troop movements there were but fourteen train
accidents involving death or injury to the men.
To all the necessities of the wartime effort of the railroads--the
enormously increased quantities of freight that had to be moved
expeditiously and the transportation of troops--was added
a considerable increase in the ordinary passenger traffic.
Notwithstanding the earnest and repeated requests of the Railroad
Administration that only necessary journeys should be taken by
civilians, a request that was, indeed, very generally heeded, and the
increase in passenger rates, the passenger traffic all over the country
was much heavier than in any previous year, the increase amounting in
the region east of Chicago to twenty-five per cent.
The efficient handling of all this enormous freight and passenger
traffic was made possible by the policies that were adopted. The
handling of the whole vast network of railroads as one system
eliminated competition and the wasteful use of time, effort and
equipment. The previous usage of the roads in accepting freight at
the convenience of the consignor without regard to the ability of the
consignee to receive it had resulted in the appalling congestion of
terminals and lines in the autumn of 1917. The Railroad Administration
based its policy upon the principle that the consignee must be
considered first and that if he could not receive the freight it was
worse than useless to fill up switches and yards with loaded cars. In
order thus to control traffic at its source a permit system was adopted
which prevented the loading of traffic unless there was assurance that
it could be disposed of at its destination. This policy proved to be
the chief factor in the ability of the transportation system to meet
the enormous demands upon it.
Modification of demurrage rules and regulations induced more rapid
unloading of cars and their quicker return to active use. Consolidation
of terminals, both freight and passenger, greatly facilitated the
handling of cars. Locomotives that could be spared were transferred
from all parts of the country to the congested eastern region.
Coördination of shop work increased the amount of repairs upon
equipment that could be done and kept locomotives and cars in better
condition while new ones were ordered and work upon them speeded.
Rolling stock and motive power were economized by doing away with
circuitous routing of freight and sending it instead by routes as short
and direct as possible, a policy which saved almost 17,000,000 car
miles in the Eastern and Northeastern Region.
A plan was devised for making up solid trains of live stock and of
perishable freight and also consolidated trains of export freight at
Western points and forwarding them on certain days of the week directly
and rapidly to their destinations. Passenger trains that had been
mainly competitive and such others as could be spared were dropped,
resulting in the elimination during the first seven months of Federal
control of 47,000,000 passenger train miles--an economy in motive power
and equipment without which the successful movement of troops would
have been impossible. Equipment was standardized, making possible its
universal use, and freight cars were more heavily loaded. In place of
the separate ticket offices made necessary by private and competitive
ownership consolidated ticket offices were opened in all large cities,
101 of these doing the work of the former 564. The result aimed at was
both economy and a better distribution of the passenger traffic.
The Railroad Administration saw in the inland and coastal waterways and
the coastwise shipping service an important possible aid in its task of
making transportation equal to wartime needs, and so mid-Western rivers
and Eastern canals were brought into coöperation with railway service
and several coast-wise lines of steamships were made a part of its
facilities.
The rental, or return, guaranteed to the railroad companies amounted
for the year approximately to $950,000,000. Upon the advice of a
commission appointed to investigate the matter of wages and living
costs among railroad employees, wages were raised and threatened labor
trouble thereby averted, the increase amounting to between $600,000,000
and $700,000,000 for the year. In the ten months ending November
1st the railroad receipts from freight, passenger and other sources
aggregated over $4,000,000,000 and were almost as large as for the
whole of the previous year. The receipts were greater by 20 per cent,
but operating expenses also had increased by more than $1,000,000,000,
the year 1918 breaking all records for both revenues and expenses.
The increase in wages, in cost of coal, and in all maintenance and
operating costs was responsible for the increase of expenses, which
would have been much greater but for the economies introduced. Freight
rates were raised during the year to help meet the raise of wages,
while a substantial increase in passenger rates was put in force both
to help in that result and to discourage unnecessary passenger traffic
during wartime conditions. There was a final balance against the
Government, as between the net income of the roads and the guaranteed
return to their owners, of between $150,000,000 and $200,000,000.
The sole purpose of the Government in taking over control of the
railroads was to achieve a more efficient prosecution of the war
by more rapidly forwarding our own war effort and by giving more
effective coöperation to our war associates. Thus, early in the
winter of 1918 the Western Allies made it known to the United States
Government that unless the food promised by the Food Administration
could be delivered to them very soon they could not continue their
war effort. This was immediately after the Railroad Administration
had taken charge of the railroads and was struggling with the freight
congestion extending through the eastern half of the country, with coal
shortage and blizzard weather. Every possible facility of the Railroad
Administration and of the roads it was operating was brought to the
emergency, and railroad officials and employees worked day and night,
with the results that by the middle of March all the available vessels
of the Allies had been filled with food and dispatched across the
Atlantic, while at Eastern seaports were 6,000 more carloads ready for
later shipment.
In carrying out this war-furthering purpose the Railroad
Administration coöperated constantly with the other war administrative
and war prosecuting agencies of the Government, the Food and Fuel
Administrations, the War Trade and War Industries Boards, the Shipping
Board, the Army and Navy Departments. Just as food, fuel, trade,
industry, labor were each and all mobilized for war effort and all
brought into harmonious and effective teamwork, so the transportation
agencies were all bent, first of all, to the same purpose. Roads,
motive power, freight and passenger equipment were devoted first to the
necessities of carrying men from homes to cantonments and camps and
thence to ports of embarkation and of moving food, munitions, supplies
and raw materials to camps, to shipment points and to places of
manufacture for war purposes. After these war needs were met whatever
remained of transportation facilities was at the disposal of the
ordinary commercial traffic of the country.
In order that the public might better understand the situation
and in order also to better the service of the roads there was
instituted a Bureau of Complaints and Suggestions which dealt with all
dissatisfactions and considered suggested improvements. A very large
number of the railroad employees of all kinds, efficient through years
of service, joined the fighting forces of the nation or engaged in work
more directly concerned with the war and so made it necessary to fill
their places with untrained help. To remedy this condition training
schools were established with successful results.
In the summer of 1918 all express companies were combined and placed
under the management of the Railroad Administration and a little later
telegraph and telephone companies, because of their refusal to accept
an award of the War Labor Board, were unified and placed under the
control of the Postmaster General, as, in the autumn, was done also
with the cable companies.