Erie Railroad - Erie Railroad Lake Line - Chicago



Excerpted from the December, 1913 issue of Erie Railroad Magazine
ERIE RAILROAD COMPANY'S CHICAGO FREIGHT AGENCY
By C.D. Turner, Division Freight Agent, Chicago, IL

With all the varied methods of handling freight within the Chicago District, it devolved upon the "New Erie" to inaugurate an extension of deliveries through the use of the Chicago River, and it was the first and only trunk line with the daring and courage to follow its own convictions, although utilizing the Chicago River for the lighterage of freight has been discussed for years by various Chicago commercial organizations. On August 18 (1913), the Erie threw open to the shipping and receiving public two stations on the Chicago River, one at Market and Washington Streets, known as "Market Square Station," for the handling of package freight in carload and less-than-carload lots, inbound, via all rail and carload, and less-than-carload lots via rail-and-lake; the other at Erie and Kingsbury Streets, known as "Erie Street Station," for the handling of package freight in carload and less-than-carload lots, inbound and outbound, all rail and rail-and-lake; and a third station will soon be opened at Webster Avenue to be known as "Webster Avenue Station."

All freight can be handled at these stations, with the following exceptions:

Acid, bulk freight, lumber, etc., coal, coke, grain in bulk, household goods, carloads or less-than-carloads; petroleum and petroleum products.

"Market Square Station" is our Erie Railroad Lake Line station, and as there is no room for team tracks, the freight is handled through the house to and from car floats. The house and dock at "Erie Street Station" are temporary structures only, to be replaced at an early date by a permanent freight house 30' X 180', together with house tracks and team tracks holding 36 cars. Work will be started at once on a permanent house at "Webster Avenue Station", 30' X 185', including a dock, house tracks and team tracks of 59 cars capacity. "Erie Street" and "Webster Avenue" Stations will be equipped with every modern appliance for handling structural steel and heavy traffic, in general. All traffic is handled by Car Float between these stations and float bridge at West Twenty-Seventh and South Robey Street, on the rails of the Chicago River & Indiana Railway. For the service there has been provided two car floats accommodating eight cars each, towed by our new tug, the FREDERICK U. ROBBINS, built for the purpose and acknowledged by river men to be the finest tug on the river. This service is similar to that performed in the North and East rivers in New York Harbor.

Assuming that not all are familiar with the location of streets in Chicago, will say that these stations open to us a vast territory never before reached through the facilities of an eastern railroad, and the enormous saving in cartage made possible by these stations, will influence traffic via Erie within an area of twenty square miles covered with industries and retail business houses.

"Market Square Station" is within a block of South Water Street, making it a desireable delivery for lemons, fruit and produce. This is the only railroad freight station within the loop district, and is by far the most convenient for all the large department stores and other business houses within the great retail district. The principal commodities now handled at this station are drygoods, fruit, lemons, printing paper, produce, sugar and cheese.

The principal commodities handled at "Erie Street," other than merchandise, are furniture, hides, leather, machinery, soap, steel, tanning materials, tin plate and wool.


Erie Tug ALICE STAFFORD", built with FREDERICK U. ROBBINS to handle Chicago River traffic


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