A CANADIAN RAILWAY PROJECT.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13097, 23 April 1908, Page 6

A CANADIAN RAILWAY PROJECT.

According to a cable message in yesterday's issue, an Ottawa report states that the Canadian Government means to build a railway to Hudson Bay, thus opening that route to Europe. For many years the idea of thus shortening the distance -which grain has to be hauled to the port of shipment has been discussed in Canada, and of late it has.come to be regarded as a practicable and desirable enterprise. The fact that such a railway would bring Liverpool 2000 miles nearer, to the grainfields of Western Canada and the North-Western States of America is a point which, in view of the congestion of oast-bound traffic on the existing lines, has como to be looked upon as a strong reason for its construction. It may be assumed that old Fort Churchill, on the western shore of Hudson Bay, is the objective of any Hudson Bay railway that may be built.' Already two lines are being driven in that direction, and one of them, which is designed to connect Churchill with the Saskatchewan railway system, had covered last June eighty miles .out of the four hundred that was to constitute its total length. For yoare the Governnr,en.t has been offering 12,000 acres of land per mile along the line of a Hudson Bay railway to anyone who would undertake the work, and not long ago Sir Wilfrid Larrrier said if this was not lufficient inducement, other means would have to be sought. It is understood that the re--mark about "other means" had refer■ance to a proposal which haa met with much support, that tbe Government should finance the whole scheme—railway and steamship line—as a national enterprise, appropriating for the purpose a percentage of the revenue from land sales. The Prime Minister is strongly in favour of the contemplated railway, and it may be that it ■will be a Government undertaking. The project, however, seems open to serious objections. ChuTchill was one of the porte of the old fur-traders, its records in this connection going back for more than two centuries. The Hudson Bay Company's ekippers gave it the reputation of being on© of the finest natural harbours in America. Aβ a trade port, however, it s-uffera from the grave drawback of being open for barely five months in tbe year—from mid-June to November. It is also eubject to furious gales all the year round, and though five miles out the Bay itself is open all -winter, the intense cold produces what is known as "frost-fog," which lies thick and heavy on the surface of the sea. - Tho straits present yet another danger; they are J the channel by which all the Arctic ice entering the Bay from tho north passes into the Atlantic, meeting in the passage a furious tids-race thirtyfive feet high. That any men or any Government should sot about building a railway to connect with a port that is beset with . such difficulties and dangers, proves how strong is the dosire for shorter railage to tho sea. The advocates of the scheme are certainly not easily deterred. "Wrecks or no wrecks," says one, "the Hudson Bay "route is coming. If the straits are ''not fit for navigation, they will be " made fit." This is the sort of faith

that mores mountains, but it will be interesting to learn how ifc proposes to deal with such, incidents oa "a tide-rip " thirty-fire feet high, and tho drift"lee rearing like fighting etalJions." To most people the shortening of the railway rout© by two thousand miles seems dearly purchased at tho cost of such perilous navigation.