Ohio River. Wherever Mississippi River charges were used as a basis, no increase was necessary as the extra cost of operation on the Mississippi River, due to swift currents, would more than offset the cost of lockages on the proposed waterway. 73. In order to check the reasonableness of the revenue accruing to the barge line, a study was made to estimate the probable line-haul cost of moving freight over the proposed waterway. This study is contained in appendix II, part 1,1 of this report. Items of cost included in the study pertain only to the line-haul costs between ports. No terminal or transfer expenses are included in the figures. The cost of moving petroleum products was computed separately from the cost of moving all other commodities. The reason for the separation is that the movement of petroleum is all in one direction. At the present time none of the petroleum companies load their barges on the return trip. Unless the barges are made "gas free," which is a rather expensive operation, regulations do not permit of any loading of the empty barges. All petroleum products were assumed to be handled by contract or private carriers, and all other commodities were divided between common and contract or private carriers, according to the nature of the commodity. For commodities handled by common carrier it was assumed that there would be a capacity load upstream and 65 percent of a full load downstream; for commodities handled by contract or private carriers, other than petroleum products, the full load was assumed to be downstream and the upstream movement was assumed to be 63.5 percent of capacity. These ratios were determined by an analysis of the traffic movements. A summary of the results of this study is shown in the following table: TABLE 18.-Summary of ton-mile costs Contract and private carriers, operating with a unit tow of five 35- by 145-foot barges: Commodities: Petroleum Common carriers, operating with a unit tow of 535- by 145-foot barges: Mills per ton-mile 2.65 2. 13 2. 16 74. Undeveloped traffic credited to waterway. The prospective commerce, shown in table 19, below, is believed to be a reasonable and fair estimate of the commerce which would be immediately available før movement over the proposed waterway. No items which are unsupported by questionnaires from prospective shippers or receivers of freight or other reliable sources are included in the estimates. In any traffic study, it is almost impossible to obtain a complete coverage of all possible items of commerce. No doubt, some sources of traffic were not covered in the survey in spite of the very careful and conscientious efforts that were made to obtain complete coverage. No amounts are included in the estimates for traffic not now apparent which might develop as a result of the construction of the proposed improvement. Experience has shown that such movements often become large and important items of commerce, and it is impossible to anticipate with any degree of accuracy the amount of this commerce. Other factors which would tend to increase the movement of commerce over the proposed waterway, but on which no definite 1 Not printed. evaluation can be placed at the present time, include the adjustment of the interterritorial freight rate situation and rate policies of the railroads with regard to water competition. In order to take into account all of the above factors, of which no estimate can be made, an arbitrary 25 percent of the total traffic was added to the tonnage developed in the survey. A unit saving equal to the average saving was applied to this arbitrary additional tonnage. 75. Amount of prospective commerce and savings.-The commerce considered immediately prospective for the proposed waterway and the savings which would accrue to the general public in reduced transportation charges, based on freight rate levels of July 1, 1938, are given in the following table, which also shows the commodities and the waterway ton-miles: TABLE 19.-Prospective commerce and savings 76. Principal commodities.-Arranged in order of volume, the six leading commodities up-bound and down-bound are shown in the following table. These commodities comprise 84.8 percent of the up-bound, 91.1 percent of the down-bound, and 87.4 percent of the total commerce credited to the waterway. TABLE 20-Principal commodities in order of volume, Tombigbee route 77. Summary of commerce credited to waterway.-A summary of the tonnage, value, savings per ton, and average waterway haul of each class of commodities, is given in the following table: TABLE 21.-Summary of prospective commerce, Tombigbee route 78. An analysis of the above tables reveals that the tonnage movements would not be balanced. The up-bound movement would be approximately 1.4 times the down-bound. There is also a great disparity between the up-bound and down-bound average saving per ton, the up-bound being 2.3 times the down-bound. The unbalanced tonnage movement indicated by the traffic survey is attributable to the large volume of petroleum products moving from the Gulf to inland points, principally in the Tennessee Valley. Petroleum products account for 42 percent of the up-bound traffic. The saving on this commodity of $2.14 per ton being relatively larger than on most of the other commodities results in an average saving per ton up-bound much higher than the average saving per ton down-bound. The downbound traffic contains no large movements on which relatively high savings are indicated. The largest single movement of logs shows an average saving of only 66 cents per ton, while the other large item, sand and gravel, shows a saving of only 22 cents per ton. 79. The average haul up-bound, shown in table 21, is longer than the average haul for down-bound traffic as a result of the longer movement of petroleum products. The large items of down-bound traffic move only a relatively short distance. 80. Analysis of traffic.-In compiling tonnage figures, the port-toport traffic and the joint rail-water traffic were tabulated separately. The port-to-port traffic was tabulated according to type of carrier. The barge-line revenue port-to-port (which does not include any terminal or transfer charges) for the common carrier and private or contract carrier was also compiled separately. These analyses of traffic are shown in the following table: TABLE 22.—Analysis of traffic-Tombigbee route It will be noted that about 78 percent of the traffic would be handled by private or contract carrier, 14 percent by common carrier, and & percent would be joint-haul traffic. These figures check very closely with the actual percentages of freight handled by contract and common carriers on existing improved waterways. From a comparison of the theoretical line-haul costs shown in paragraph 73, the bargeline revenues per ton-mile appear to be more than adequate. The common-carrier revenues are somewhat higher than Federal Barge Line revenues on the Mississippi and Warrior Rivers. The higher revenues reflected in this study are due to a large extent to the fact that many items of commerce were eliminated from consideration where barge-line revenue was considered not compensatory. An analysis of the Federal Barge Line's reports shows that on some items revenue accruing to the Federal Barge Line is as low as 1 mill per ton-mile. These low rates tend to bring down the average revenue per ton-mile. The same is true in general of private and contractcarrier operations. 81. Geographical distribution of commerce, Tombigbee route. In the following table there is presented an analysis of the commerce on the proposed waterway, showing the distribution of the traffic according to various territorial subdivisions. These various subdivisions are shown on chart No. 6,1 following page 59. This table indicates that movements of commerce are confined principally between points in the Tombigbee Valley itself, between the Gulf coast and the Tennessee Valley, and between the Gulf coast and the upper Tombigbee Valley. Less than 120,000 tons of commerce would move between the southern territory and other territories. 1 Not printed. |