Linking the Garden City to the River
Businessmen in Walla Walla look to dominate Columbia River trade by building a high-speed road and wharves at Wallula.
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Walla Walla businessmen do not intend to let thirty miles stand between them and the freight savings of the Columbia River. The connecting link they intend to use is a hard-surface road and wharves at Wallula. This road, designed for heavy automobile trucks, will require significant investment. In the meantime, steps have been taken to create a port district at Wallula. The Pan-Columbia steamboat line is cooperating with Walla Walla businessmen, offering to absorb all transfer charges from boat to rail—a distance of 1.8 miles—to encourage river business.
“It is impossible to bring the city to the river or the river to the city but commercially speaking it is possible to link the two together.”
The infrastructure race to connect inland hubs to river ports defined regional economic growth a century ago. Today, the debate over the Columbia River system and shipping logistics remains a centerpiece of regional political and economic tension.
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