TT4-2-2003E.pdf - Office des transports du Canada

A new method of answering the needs ofthe shippers and the railway companieswas found in the Maritime Freight RatesAct that was adopted in 1927. The Actreduced by 20 per cent the local tariffsand rates on freight originating in theMaritimes and bound for other parts ofCanada. The Act also allowed for thecompensation of railways for any lossesresulting from the reductions. The Boardwas given the task of determining theannual compensation for the railways.Also in 1927, the Railway Board issued adecision in the General Rates Investigation bywhich it maintained the higher mountaintariff and transcontinental rates to interiorpoints; it also ordered a lower rate on grainover the Canadian National route fromthe West to Québec City, and requiredrailways to adopt a more liberal interpretationof the 1925 grain legislation.In 1929, approval of tolls for internationalbridges and tunnels was addedto the Board’s jurisdiction.In the Annual Report for that year, theBoard stated that the fire season wasone of the worst seen in 40 years in thePrairie provinces. What the reportdescribed as a “long period of extremedrought and high winds in the West”resulted in a poor grain crop that fall.There was more bad news to come.At the end of October, the Wall Streetstock market suffered a drastic fall invalues. On the same day, the WinnipegGrain Exchange was hit by falling prices.The Great Depression had arrived.Hundreds of thousands of Canadianswere unemployed, some starved, otherslost their homes, and families werebroken apart.The government looked for ways to offerassistance. By 1933, more than a millionCanadians were on government-fundedrelief. Make-work projects were establishedto give jobs to the unemployed.Among the projects were severalsupported by the Railway Grade CrossingFund. From 1930 to 1938, the governmentincreased its financial allotment tothe Fund, which had been administeredby the Board since 1909, to contributeto safety improvements at highwaycrossings, now with the added objectiveof providing work.The railways also made use of governmentrelief funds to clear the railwayrights of way. A huge clearing effort in1936 led to this report from the Board’sfire inspector: “During the season of1936 the railways… carried out a largeamount of right-of-way clearing withspecial gangs recruited from the ranks ofthe unemployed who had heretoforebeen domiciled in labour campsthroughout the country. This work willhave beneficial results in greatly reducingthe fire hazard.”23Chapter One — ALL A BOARD 1904 TO 1938