. Cost, capitalization and estimated value of American railways; . f the roads were built by construction companieswhose records are not in existence, and then turned over tosome other company at a different value than the original of the roads are undergoing constant improvements; infact, some of them have been almost entirely rebuilt since thetime of their first construction. The original cost as well asthe amount that has been expended upon the plant to anygiven date, exclusive of the maintenance, are items that forthese and other reasons cannot be obtained, and which wouldprobabl
. Cost, capitalization and estimated value of American railways; . f the roads were built by construction companieswhose records are not in existence, and then turned over tosome other company at a different value than the original of the roads are undergoing constant improvements; infact, some of them have been almost entirely rebuilt since thetime of their first construction. The original cost as well asthe amount that has been expended upon the plant to anygiven date, exclusive of the maintenance, are items that forthese and other reasons cannot be obtained, and which wouldprobably be of little value if they could be had. There is little reason to doubt, however, that the $13,000,000,-000 the bookkeeping cost of construction fairly represents theamount of money that between 1830 and 1906 has been ex-pended in bringing the railways of America up from the 23miles of experiments with horses and 7-ton engines for motivepower, to the 309,218 miles of track upon which engines weigh-ing as high as 175 tons drag trains carrying an average of 322. Baldwin Compound, 1906. Weight on Drivers, 350,000 Lbs. tons of freight. At every step money has been spent that hasnever appeared in the construction account, some of it onroads that have disappeared from the map; much of it has gone 94 in driblets—here an additional spike, there one more tie perrail; here a hundred feet of siding, there miles of double track;everywhere betterments and improvements charged to operat-ing expenses or paid for out of surplus income, amounting insome instances to more than the dividends and often where nodividends were declared. Cost Measured by Traffic. The extent and cost of the improvements during three-quartersof a century cannot be ascertained, but it can be measured bythe growth in the volume of traffic. The type of the physicalstructure of the railway, the strength of its track and bridges,the length of its auxiliary track, the character and cost of itsdepots, freiglit ho
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