Despite this remarkable record of growth, a corresponding development of long-distance communication between different parts of the country had not yet taken place. While the all-rail routes were open, they still consisted in large part of disconnected local lines. The New York Central with difficulty in 1853, and in spite of intense local opposition, succeeded in effecting a consolidation of what were originally eleven separate lines; but the union with the Hudson River Railroad was not to follow until 1869. The Boston & Albany was still a local enterprise, although built with larger ends in view. At this time the possibility of long-distance carriage of grain was only very dimly appreciated. Fast freight lines to operate without breaking bulk over independent roads, constituted the first step in this direction. Such companies on the New York Central in 1855 and on the Erie two years later, were operating in the eastern trunk territory. The so-called Green lines were engaging in long distance business by way of Ohio river connections between the territory to the northwest and the great grain and pork consuming cotton belt. But railroad traffic as a whole was still relatively unimportant as compared with water carriage. The culmination of steadily increasing receipts on the Erie Canal did not occur until 1856. River tonnage went on steadily increasing for another twenty years. The years just before the war seem to have marked the turning point in respect of canal competition; but the total volume of railroad shipments, nevertheless, still appears insignificant by comparison with the present day. The total traffic in 1859 on the Pennsylvania Railroad was only 353,000 tons east bound and 190,700 tons west bound; while on the New York Central it was 570,900 and 263,400 tons, respectively. The important point was that the cost of shipment was steadily declining. According to H. C. Carey, the passenger rate from Chicago to New York had fallen from about seventy-five dollars to seventeen dollars in 1850; while the freight rate per bushel on wheat had fallen to twenty-seven cents; and per barrel of flour to eighty cents. Nothing but the development of a large surplus production in the West was needed to create a great traffic; and this was dependent upon the spread of population and improvements in agricultural production which had not yet occurred. Transportation as yet waited upon the progress of invention; not in instruments of transportation alone, but in all the other fields of industrial endeavor.