less value than the commodity considered herein and many of them are used as animal feed or ingredients thereof.

We find that the combination rates assailed have not been and are not unreasonable or unduly prejudicial. The complaint will be dismissed.

CAMPBELL, Commissioner, concurring in part:

Some of the assailed rates appear to have been and to be higher than the contemporaneous sixth-class rates from and to the same points. To the extent that this was and is true I believe the assailed rates were and are unreasonable. In other respects I concur in the foregoing findings.

157 I. C. C.

No. 20837

UNITED STATES LIME PRODUCTS

CORPORATION

ATCHISON, TOPEKA & SANTA FE RAILWAY COMPANY ET AL.

Submitted January 26, 1929. Decided September 4, 1929

Rates and minimum weights on lime and lime products, in carloads, from Sloan, Nev., to certain destinations in California, found not unreasonable but unduly prejudicial. Undue prejudice ordered removed.

Gwyn H. Baker for complainants.

J. R. Bell, J. M. Souby, E. E. Bennett, H. H. McElroy, Berne Levy, L. N. Bradshaw, J. E. Lyons, Elmer Westlake, John F. Bon, and Platt Kent for defendants.

R. S. Sawyer for interveners.

REPORT OF THE COMMISSION

DIVISION 3, COMMISSIONERS AITCHISON, TAYLOR, AND PORTER

BY DIVISION 3:

Exceptions were filed by interveners to the report proposed by the examiner, and complainant replied thereto.

Complainant, a corporation, manufactures lime and lime products at Sloan, Nev. By complaint filed March 10, 1928, as amended, it alleges that the rates and minimum weights on lime and lime products, in carloads, from Sloan to certain destinations in California are unreasonable and unduly prejudicial to it and unduly preferential of competitors in Arizona and California. We are asked to prescribe lawful rates and minimum weights for the future. Rates will be stated in cents per 100 pounds. Two of complainant's competitors, the Oro Grande Lime & Stone Company and the Grand Canyon Lime & Cement Company, corporations at Colton, Calif., and Nelson, Ariz., respectively, intervened.

Sloan is on the Los Angeles & Salt Lake, 469 miles south of Salt Lake City, Utah, and 315 miles northeast of Los Angeles, Calif. Limestone deposits in that vicinity are plentiful, and at the present rate of use it is estimated that complainant's supply will not be exhausted within 100 years. Complainant's plant has a monthly capacity of about 3,500 tons of refined lime products, including quicklime, hydrated lime, and crushed limestone, about 90 per cent of which is shipped to California. A small tonnage is exported.

East of Sloan there are practically no markets available to complainant.

Lime varies as to quality and has many uses. These facts are not relied upon to justify any variations in the transportation charges according to quality or use but as part of the proof that about 75 per cent of all refined lime products are competitive in the same market. The competition encountered by complainant is chiefly with producing plants located at points' in California and Arizona. It also meets competition with lime shipped by boat from Washington and Oregon to San Francisco and Oakland and distributed inland by rail. The destinations here considered are on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe, hereinafter termed the Santa Fe, and the Southern Pacific beyond their junctions with the Los Angeles & Salt Lake in southern California and include such cities as Sacramento, San Jose, San Diego, and intermediate points as well as stations on the San Joaquin Valley and Coast Line routes of the Southern Pacific. The physical characteristics of the authorized tariff routes are established by the evidence, but these considerations relate to transportation generally through the major traffic lanes and not alone to the transportation of lime. The authorized routes, depending upon the destinations of the traffic, are over the Los Angeles & Salt Lake to Daggett, Calif., and thence the Santa Fe when destined to stations on that line or on the lines of its connections beyond; and over the Los Angeles & Salt Lake to Los Angeles, thence the Southern Pacific when destined to stations on either the San Joaquin Valley or Coast Lines of that carrier.

The assailed rates and minimum weights from Sloan to representative destinations which are defined as typical competitive markets, together with the rates and minimum weights sought are shown in the following table compiled from exhibits of record:

1 Puntenney and Nelson, Ariz.; Colton, Kilbeck, Santa Cruz, Rincon, Felton, Lindsay, and Tehachapi, Calif.; and Dolomite, Utah. The issues do not include Dolomite.

The rates and minimum weights contemporaneously maintained on lime and lime products from representative competitive producing points are as follows:

Nelson is on the main line of the Santa Fe, 283 miles east of Barstow, Calif. Puntenney is on the Ash Fork branch of the Santa Fe, 23 miles south of the main line, and 361 miles east of Barstow. Sloan is 165 miles northeast of Barstow. Beyond Barstow the haul to all Santa Fe destinations is the same whether the traffic originates at Sloan, Nelson, or Puntenney. From the competitive producing points in California herein before named, the applicable minimum also is 30,000 pounds. Certain of the commodities here considered do not store well for any length of time, and because of the commercial demands of many small dealers the market favors the smaller trade unit of 30,000 pounds. Evidently these considerations influenced the establishment and maintenance of that minimum from Nelson and Puntenney and generally from the competing producing points in California. Lime reaching the Pacific Coast cities by boat and distributed thence to inland California points on the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific is transported in minimum carload quantities of 30,000 pounds.

Complainant concedes that the alleged violations of section 3 of the interstate commerce act arise principally from the differences in the minimum weights. For example, using Fresno as a destination and bearing in mind that the transportation beyond Barstow is over the same railroads whether the lime originates at Puntenney or Sloan, it will be observed that the transportation charges per car from Sloan under the 60,000-pound minimum and 24.5-cent rate are double those concurrently applicable at the same rate from Puntenney under the 30,000-pound minimum. It will be observed also that complainant has available from Sloan a 40,000-pound minimum at a higher rate of 31.5 cents, which yields $126 per car or approximately 172 per cent of the contemporaneous charge from Puntenney. From Nelson to Fresno the rate is 21.5 cents at the 30,000-pound minimum,

or but $64.50 per car. Defendants contend that complainant's evidence does not establish the need of a minimum of 30,000 pounds. The voluntary maintenance by the Southern Pacific and the Santa Fe of the 30,000-pound minimum on local California traffic as well as on Arizona-California interstate traffic and ex-ocean traffic, gives support to complainant's contention that a trade unit of that weight is most proper.

The 31.5-cent rate at the 40,000-pound minimum is blanketed from Bakersfield north to San Francisco and intermediate points in San Joaquin Valley, and also to stations on the Southern Pacific Coast Lines. From Nelson and Puntenney rates of 21.5 and 24.5 cents, respectively, minimum 30,000 pounds, apply for greater distances than from Sloan to the same San Joaquin Valley points and also to San Diego. However, from those same competing points to Southern Pacific Coast Line stations, such as Santa Barbara and Watsonville, the rates are from 2.5 to 5.5 cents higher than from Sloan; but the Sloan minimum of 40,000 pounds results in a substantially greater charge for a minimum carload from Sloan. From Sloan to Sacramento, 587 miles, the applicable rate is 34 cents, minimum 60,000 pounds, whereas for hauls of 703 and 781 miles, respectively, shippers at Nelson and Puntenney pay only 24.5 cents at the 30,000-pound minimum. Another illustration is the Sloan-San Diego 31.5-cent rate, 390 miles, at the 30,000-pound minimum as compared with rates of 21.5 and 24.5 cents from Nelson and Puntenney for 506 and 561 miles, respectively. These facts are sufficient to sustain complainant's allegation of undue prejudice.

The relief sought by complainant is a blanket rate of 24.5 cents at the 30,000-pound minimum, the same as now voluntarily maintained. from Puntenney to destinations in the San Joaquin Valley. From Sloan to most of the California destinations north of Bakersfield, for distances of more than 400 miles, that rate would yield car-mile revenue ranging from 10 to 18.5 cents. It yields even less under the present application from Puntenney. The assailed rate of 31.5 cents, minimum 40,000 pounds, yields a car-mile revenue of approximately 25 cents for an average distance of 500 miles.

The evidence is not conclusive that lime from all the competitive producing points defined of record, including Sloan, Nelson, and Puntenney, as well as producing points in California, and ex-ocean line transshipped from the ports, will not move in unit quantities of 40,000 pounds. From some of those points the record shows the average loading to be even heavier. Moreover the volume of movement from Sloan during the past two years has increased despite the higher minima of 60,000 and 40,000 pounds maintained from that point. But this does not justify the maintenance of the rates and