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The Transportation Revolution

The Transportation Revolution began in the early 1800’s due to the results of a growing economy, advancements in technology and agriculture and a want for Westward expansion. The transportation revolution continued to help early America establish a national economy and trade. Also, the American people were on the move more than ever, as they expanded westward. This was also a period where technology was advancing in the ways of creating steamboats, roads, railroads, canals and cars. Every new form of transportation improved the quality and quantity of American life.

Four main movements of the Transportation Revolution

In 1811, there was a plan for road development that would link two rivers; the Potomac and the Ohio River. This was the first major highway in American and was named the National Road. During this period, steamboats were introduced as an advantage of water transportation. While they proved to be a major advancement in traversing rivers, there earlier developments proved to be dangerous. The next addition to improving water transportation was the creation of canals such as the Erie Canal. Transportation advancements on land were the biggest projects and the most valuable to the American people. These developments created a competitive economy in America, as certain goods could be sold cheaper. The development of railroads played the biggest role in creating competition. Yet, railroad tracks brought America closer together and helped in the development of cities as well.

Seventh Annual Message to Congress

President James Madison (1809-1817) was the first to recognize the need for a better and structural road system that would benefit the nation’s economy, military and political system. In Madison’s Seventh Annual Message to Congress he addressed a need for “establishing throughout our country the roads and canals which can best be executed under the national authority.”

Westward Expansion

By 1800, most of America’s population lived east of the Mississippi. Lands west of the river were still yet to be discovered and settled. This changed after three primary events; the Louisiana Purchase from France, the end of the War of 1812 and the Westward migration. The purchase of Louisiana doubled the size of the nation and the end of the war drew attention to the needs and safety of the new western territories. The Westward migration was the largest impact because people moved as families to the unsettled new lands. Many pioneers went west for opportunities that the South and New England couldn’t afford them such as cheap land and the search for gold. As these pioneers began to cross the Mississippi and the Appalachian Mountains, they began to settle and clear the land to start farms. Once the West became settled by families and communities, it proved to be an economic powerhouse by providing the coasts with products and good. The only thing holding back the distribution of good and products from the west to the east was the amount of time it took for them to travel. Thus, a need for a transportation revolution evolved.

Roads

As a result of transportation difficulties the military faced during the War of 1812, toll roads or turn pikes were the first sign of the transportation revolution. These roads got their names because they were locally and privately funded roads set up by barriers of spikes at certain spots. When a wagon showed up it would have to pay the toll for the spikes to move off to the side and let them through

Philadelphia Turnpike

Funded by private companies and completed in 1974, the first turnpike was built in Pennsylvania and connected Philadelphia to Lancaster. The completion of the Philadelphia-Lancaster turnpike resulted in a “turnpike boom” from the 1790s to the late 1830s. New York was the next state to build a turnpike in 1799 that began in Albany.

The National Road

The first turnpike to be funded by the federal government is known as the Cumberland Road or National Road. Beginning in 1811, this turnpike was split up and built into segments. Congress spent $100,000 building the segment from Cumberland, Maryland to Wheeling, Virginia (now West Virginia). (5.) The first segment of the road was completed in 1818 and continued to stretch westward till its final completion in 1852. The National Road stretches 620 miles through the Appalachian, connecting the Potomac River to the Ohio River.

Advantages of Turnpikes

“More than 3,700 miles of turnpikes, or toll roads, were built between 1790 and 1820. Continuing through the 1840s, many thousands of miles of improved county and town roads were constructed as well. The new roads were far better constructed and maintained, and allowed for much faster travel. In response, the number of vehicles on the roads increased rapidly, far faster than population.” Although the numbers of stagecoaches were increasing, the National Road drastically increased the population in the west. The settlers of the Indiana Territory escalated from 24,520 in 1810 to 63,897 in 1815.

Economic disadvantages

While the new roads improved transportation for the military and shortened travel time, economically they didn’t contribute much at all. Toll roads ended up being a poor investment because the tolls were too high for longer hauls and drivers would simply go around them without paying. Also, few of the turnpikes built in the early 19th century were never completed. High cost of maintenance and poor management along with the advancements of railroads and canals at the time resulted in a poor economical profit from turnpikes.

Bridges

Bridges were the immediate outcome of the turnpike boom. The production of bridges further helped cut the cost and time of travel, such as the bridge over the Hudson River at Newburgh, New York. Bridges were used a lot and unlike turnpikes, they ended up creating large revenue The first bridges of the nineteenth century were mainly built with wood as the superstructure and stones used for piers and supports. The earliest bridges in the East were mostly covered bridges with roof shingles. Bridges were maintained my private companies such as turnpikes but unlike the roads failed attempt and generating revenue, bridges proved to be successful.

Steamboats

Rivers proved to be an economic advancement once steamboats were introduced to the nation’s waters. Steamboats allowed goods to be moved up and down stream between the south and north. They also provided water transportation for the public where many people could pile on a boat for one trip. The term steamboat is usually used to refer to smaller steam-powered boats working on lakes and rivers, particularly riverboats; steamship generally refers to larger steam-powered ships, usually ocean-going, capable of carrying a (ship's) boat.

John Fitch and Robert Fulton

John Fitch built the first American steamer in 1787. However, he could not gather enough investors to finance his boat and in 1798 he committed suicide. The first commercial steamboat, the Clermont, was built by Robert Fulton in 1807 and it took to the waters of the Hudson River traveling from New York to Albany. Fulton demonstrated the watercraft on the Hudson River and won a monopoly from the New York legislature to form a steamboat ferrying service between New York and New Jersey. The monopoly was broken in 1824 when Marshall's Supreme Court, in Gibbons v. Ogden, declared that regulation of interstate commerce, a federal power, also applied to navigation.

Floating Danger

While steamboats proved to be a huge asset for water travel of goods and people, they could be extremely dangerous. Many boats were prone to fires on board and boiler explosions. In five year from 1825 to 1830, forty-two exploding boilers killed 273 people. In 1838, a boiler explosion in Charleston took 140 lives. After that tragic event, Congress responded by implementing a federal regulation that steamboat boiler had to bear a certificate from a government inspector.

Canals

Steamboats were limited to the available waterways, some which were to narrow and short. Canals became the answer to improve steamboat travel. By 1816 on 100 miles of canals existed in America before the canal craze of 1810-1830. Canals connect two natural waterways or parallel a single stream so as to avoid waterfalls, rapids or obstructions. Locks raised or lowered the water level. Horses or mules walk along a towpath to move barges through the canal. Canals already existed in Europe, but America was slow at building them due to lack of engineering, distance, small population and price. They were much more expansive to build than turnpikes, and public funding proved even more important in raising the capital for them.

The Erie Canal

At the end of the War of 1812, New York City mayor, De Witt Clinton proposed building a canal that would connect Albany and Buffalo, New York. The canal would run 364 miles, making it the longest canal in the world. Construction began in 1817 and the canal wasn’t completed until 1823. On October 26, 1825, the mayor boarded the Seneca Chief in Lake Erie and on November 2, 1825, the first boats cleared the final locks and made their way into the Albany basin. The Erie canal was an instant financial success. It reduced travel time from New York City to Buffalo from 20 days to six and reduced the cost of moving a ton of freight form $100 to $5. It also moved the country a step closer to linking the Mississippi Valley and the Atlantic Ocean. The Erie canal also made New York City the “Empire State” it is today. Its operation stimulated both agriculture and manufacturing and transformed the quality and quantity of life in western New York State. Within the first nine years of operating, the canal made back the $7 million it cost to build.

Other Canals

Trying to imitate the success of the Erie Canal, other states began to build their own. Ohio was the next state to build a canal that linked Cleveland to Portsmouth on the Ohio River. The Ohio-Erie canal was completed in 1833 and ran 308 miles long. In 1826, Matthew Carey approached the Pennsylvania legislature to build the Mainline Canal in hopes of competing with New York. This was the most extensive canal system of any state and wasn’t completed until 1834 and ran a total of 395 miles linking Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania’s attempt at building a canal was a bit too late; it missed the heart of the canal craze and was rivaled by the first railroads Miami-Erie Canal built in the western part of Ohio, from Cincinnati to Dayton in 1832, and to Toledo in 1845.

Railroads

Railroads were first invented in Britain by a man named George Stephenson. In 1814 he invented a steam locomotive that could pull coal from the mine shaft to a nearby dock for loading onto a barge. The first engines used in the United States were purchased from the Stephenson Works in England. But, before the United States invested in the biggest contribution to the Transportation Revolution, in 1826 the first existing railways were animal-drawn cars that carried supplies for short distances. Beginning in 1828 and lasting throughout the 1830s, railroads dominated all early forms of transportation in the United States. Railroad construction was slowed by the Panic of 1837, but by 184 the United States had laid over 3,000 miles of tracks. By 1860, the U.S. saw development of over 30,000 miles or railroad track, three-fourths of which were in the industrialized north.

Baltimore & Ohio Railroad

In 1828, the first railroad development in America was in Baltimore where twenty-three miles of track opened. At the opening ceremony on July 4, 1828, Charles Carroll, the only surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence states, “I consider this among the most important acts of my life, second only to my signing of the Declaration of Independence, if even it be second to that.”

Peter Cooper

To adapt to the inclines and sharp curves, a manufacturer, Peter Cooper developed a locomotive with a shorter wheelbase and smaller wheels. His invention impressed the B&O representatives so much that they implemented his design.

South Carolina Canal and Railroad Company

In 1833 Charleston, South Carolina built the nation’s second railroad in attempts to compete with Savannah, Georgia. This railroad became the longest in the world at 136 miles long. It had a steam locomotive built at the West Point Foundry in New York City, called THE BEST FRIEND OF CHARLESTON, the first steam locomotive to be built for sale in the United States.

Triumph of the Railroad

By 1860, the railroad as a major instrument of transportation had come of age. Already it had built great cities, hastened the settlement of the West, made farming practicable on the prairies, and greatly stimulated the flow of internal commerce. While other forms of transportation that blossomed during this revolution began to fade, such as the disappearance of turnpike companies and the abandoning of canals, the railroad was in full force. It was soundly managed, well located, and built to meet present rather than future traffic needs.