Sectional
jealousies delayed the work, and piled up a debt incurred partly for
branch canals in various parts of the state; but by 1830 over four
hundred miles of canal had been built in Pennsylvania and five
hundred more projected. Not until 1835 was the trunk line between
Philadelphia and Pittsburgh fully in operation, however, and in the
decade after 1822 the total expenditure for internal improvements in
the state amounted to nearly twenty-six million dollars, of which
over ten millions was contributed by individual subscription. But
the steam railroad proved too strong a competitor, the state was
plunged too deeply in debt, and it was not many years before the
public works were sold, and the era of the corporation opened.
Meanwhile the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal project [Footnote: Hulbert,
Historic Highways, XIII., chap, iii.; Ward, Chesapeake and Ohio
Canal (Johns Hopkins Univ. Studies, XVII.)] had gained great impetus
under the efforts of those who wished to turn the tide of western
commerce to the Potomac River.
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