War Demands on Transportation Facilities Called Maior Factor in LumberSupply

Recently R. A. Colgan, Jr., executive vice president, National Lumber 1\Ianufacturers Association, Washington, D. C. stated that "lumber manufacturers, particularly in the West, are no\\r suffering the worst railroad car shortage the lumber industry has ever known." Mr. Colgan pointed out that this situation has resulted from the urgency of getting rvar materials to the Korean front. As an example of this condition, NIr. Colgan cited the fact that railroad cars from the N{idl'est and East going to West Coast ports u'ith necessary \\rar materiel are not being delayed even a ferr. days for reloading. Empty cars are being returned to points u'here they can be loaded with needed supplies and sent back to the \\rest Coast'

According to H. V. Sin.rpson, executive vice president, West Coast Lumberman's Assbciation, "the sizeallle number of railroad cars no\\r being taken out of commercial use has resulted in the fact that the West Coast lumber industry, rvhich rvas already short of railroad cars, now has less than 5O% of the needed railroad cars to ship Douglas fir lurnber stocks on hand."

Considering the fact that more rhan 58/a of the nation's san' timber is located in the western states and that West Coast lumber production alone is '/a b\llion board feet per week. the situation of being unable to transport this amount of needed lumber is rapidly resulting in an acute lumber supply situation.

The railroads are doing what they can to remedy the present bad situation but little progress is being made. Undoubtedly much of the difficulty is due to the fact that there are 52,606 ferver railroad cars available to industry today than there u'ere last year. Despite announced plans for repair of many cars now in unuseable condition and orders for an additional 100,000 cars the fact stands that r1o more lumber can be made available to the public than can be shipped.

An added complexity in the transportation picture has been the reduction in available steamships for carrying lumber from the West Coast to Atlantic ports. This has resulted in Eastern buyers turning to all-rail deliveries and has throrvn an even greater load on the already overbrrrdened rail lines.