This policy had to be abandoned, for other roads were extending their lines in Iowa and Illinois, and the Rock Island’s share of Western business tended to fall off with the construction of rival lines west of the Missouri. As the report of 1889 expressed it, “while the lines of this company terminated at the Missouri its competitors for business had extended beyond, reaching in many cases the extreme western boundaries of population and even further. Thus the volume of traffic received by the company for carriage to and from the West was materially affected, while in order to restore the equilibrium overbalanced by the reduction in rates, the reverse was necessary, a larger rather than a smaller share of the tonnage to and from points west of the Missouri was demanded by the situation.” The directors were forced against their will to take active measures in self-protection. As early as 1884 a bond issue was approved for construction from Minneapolis westward to an eventual junction with the Northern Pacific.[650] Building was to be carried on in the name of the Wisconsin, Minnesota & Pacific Railroad Company, and the securities of this company were to be received by the Rock Island as collateral for the issue which it made.[651] Two years later more extensive plans were put on foot, and the Chicago, Kansas & Nebraska Railroad Company was organized to carry out construction west of the Missouri. The new company had a capital stock of $15,000,000, and then (1887) of $30,000,000, and an indebtedness in 1889 of $25,141,000 6 per cent first mortgage bonds; and turned over all of its bonds, and practically all of its stock to the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway in consideration of advances made to it. The Rock Island Company in its turn reserved the branch-line bonds as collateral, and issued against them its own 5 per cent collateral and extension bonds; agreeing to supply all money needed for construction and equipment,[652] and leasing the new railway at a rental of 30 per cent of its gross earnings.[653] Under this arrangement 1388 miles were built by 1889 and 276 leased, making a total of 1664.4. In 1889 it was thought more convenient to consolidate the two systems, so interest was defaulted on the Chicago, Kansas & Nebraska bonds, and foreclosure proceedings commenced; resulting in 1891, in spite of protests by municipalities along the route, in a foreclosure sale and union of the two properties in name as well as in fact. The collateral bonds of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific now became a direct instead of an indirect lien upon the Kansas & Nebraska mileage.[654]