Railroads 
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“plocked.” At present many railroads are substituting electric power 
for steam, and far more would do this if the change were less costly. 
On many roads the cost of operation would be diminished if electric 
power were used, but the expense of buying electric locomotives to 
replace steam locomotives and of installing wires and power stations 
makes the roads hesitate to change. 
Why the United States has the greatest railroad mileage. The 
world has about 720,000 miles of railroads. The United States has 
about 37 per cent of this great length, Russia and Siberia 7, Germany 
6, Canada 5, India 5, France 4, Australia 4, Great Britain 3, Argentina 
3, Brazil 3, Mexico 2, Hungary 2, Italy 2, and South Africa, Sweden, 
Spain, Czecho-Slovakia, Japan, China, Chile, Belgium, Egypt, 
Austria, and Switzerland about one per cent each. 
Although the United States is about three fourths the size of Eu- 
rope, its railroads are about 50,000 miles longer. There are four chief 
reasons for this fact: 
(1) The United States is favored with great natural wealth. Rich 
mines, fertile fields, and valuable forests as well as active manu- 
facturing industries furnish such abundant products that the in- 
ternal commerce of the United States is estimated to be greater 
than the total international commerce of the world. 
(2) 
While Europe has but one intensely active region, — the 
western part, — the United States has two, — the eastern half 
and the Pacific states. These two distant regions are con- 
nected by numerous long railroads. 
The coast of the United States is not so deeply indented as that 
of Europe, and is only about one fourth as long. Hence much 
of the commerce that would be carried by water in Europe must 
depend on railroads here. 
(3) 
(4) 
Europe has more than a hundred thousand miles of navigable 
rivers and canals to help carry her freight, while the United 
States has scarcely a tenth as much. 
Why the railroads of Europe differ from those in the United States. 
A traveler from the United States is impressed by the small size of 
the European railway cars. Few of them have the size of our great 
coaches, pullmans, and dining cars. Instead of being arranged with 
the seats on the two sides of a corridor which extends from end to end, 
the European cars are divided into many little compartments entered 
by doors on the sides. Half of the passengers face forward and half 
backward. Often it is not possible to walk from end to end of the train 
except on an outside step which runs the whole length of each car.