to reach customers located outside the loop. The workforce had declined considerably from the tunnel's heyday, with just 30 motormen operating the trains. The tunnel workforce was so dominated by attrition that someone with 25 years of experience in the tunnel was viewed as a newcomer. Merchandise In 1914, the tunnel had direct connections for freight interchange (by elevator) with 26 railroads and two boat lines. In addition, there were four public tunnel stations where shippers could drop or pick up merchandise, and 36 industries had direct tunnel connections, including Chicago's big department stores, Marshall Field's, Carson Pirie Scott and Rothchild's. In 1913, the tunnel carried 544,071 carloads or of merchandise. Of this, 231,585 carloads were sent from public stations, 177,743 carloads from industrial customers served by the tunnel, and 134,743 carloads from railroad freight terminals. Mail The Illinois Tunnel Company built connections to post offices and passenger stations specifically for mail service. Tunnel mail service began in September 1906 at a contracted rate of $172,600 per year. Within six months, it became apparent that the Tunnel Company was having difficulty with timely delivery, and the post office threatened to abrogate its contract. Mail service through the tunnels was terminated at the end of the two-year contract. In 1953, the tunnel company again explored getting into the mail business. Aside from brief experiments, this went nowhere. Coal In 1914, 22 buildings had tunnel connections for coal delivery, including the First National Bank of Chicago, several hotels, Marshall Field's, City Hall and the County Building. A total of 16,414 carloads or of coal were handled in 1913. The tunnel had two coal receiving stations in 1915 for loading coal onto tunnel trains. One was served by the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad, the other by the Chicago and Alton Railroad. Surface railroad cars dumped coal into bins under the track, from which chutes led down to the tunnel. A tunnel car could be loaded with a full load of of coal in two seconds. Coal was carried in side-dump cars, from which it was dumped into a hopper below each customer's boiler room. A conveyor then carried the coal up from the trackside hopper to the customer's boiler room. The details of the latter connection depended on the depth of the building's basement. Chicago's new City building on the corner of Washington and LaSalle had a subbasement below sidewalk level, so