Chap. 4.—An ACT to amend and re-enact an act entitled an act to authorize
any railroad company, with the consent of the State corporation com-
mission, to construct, purchase or take a lease of any railroad not exceed-
ing twenty-five miles in length, which will furnish a cut-off or connecting
line for the more efficient and economical transportation of traffic,
approved March 5, 1908, so as to authorize the construction, purchase or
lease of a railroad with the consent of the State corporation commission
not exceeding forty miles in length to furnish a cut-off or connecting line
for the more efficient and economical transportation of traffic. (H. B. 5)

Approved February 1, 1915.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That any rail-
road company incorporated under the laws of this State, or of this State
and another state or states, may, with the consent of the State corpora-
tion commission first obtained, construct, purchase or take a lease of
any railroad, not exceeding forty miles in length, which will furnish
said company a cut-off or connecting line between two points on its
own line for the more efficient and economical transportation of traffic
passing between said two points; and any railroad company incorporated
under the laws of this State, or of this State and another state or states
owning a completed or partly completed line suitable for such cut-off
or connecting line, may, with the consent of the State corporation com-
mission first obtained, sell or lease the same to such other corporation ;
but the consent as aforesaid of the State corporation commission shall
be given only if said commission shall be of the opinion that the pur-
pose and effect of the construction, purchase or lease of such cut-off
or connecting line is, and will be, to enable the company constructing
or purchasing the same or taking a lease thereof, to transport its traffic
passing between such two points more efficiency and economically by
reason of the lower grades or better alignment of such cut-off or con-
necting line, or for other cause; provided, however, that the construc-
tion, purchase or lease of any such cut-off or connecting railroad shall
not relieve the company constructing or purchasing the same, or taking
a lease thereof, from any legal obligation to operate any portion of its
line or lines of railroad; but nothing in this act shall be construed to
repeal, or in any way to modify the provisions of section nineteen of
an act of the general assembly of Virginia entitled an act concerning
the exercise of power of eminent domain, approved January eighteenth,
nineteen hundred and four, and found in chapter six hundred and eight
of the acts of assembly, extra session, nineteen hundred and two, three,
our.

2. Any railroad accepting the provisions of this act or taking ad-
vantage thereof by acting under it or obtaining the benefits thereof,
shall be conclusively presumed to have thereby waived any and all
exemptions from taxation it may have, and every non-repealable feature
of its charter or charters or amendments thereof, and also all exclusive
rights or privileges theretofore granted to it by the general assembly, and
not enjoyed by other corporations of a similar general character, and to
have thereby agreed to thereafter hold its charter and franchise, and all
amendments thereof, under the provisions, and subject to all the require-
ments, terms and conditions of the Constitution of Virginia, and of
‘any laws passed in pursuance thereof, so far as the same may be appli-
cable to such corporation.

_ 3. An emergency existing by reason of the public benefit to be de-
rived from the speedy commencement of the works herein authorized,
this act shall be in force from its passage.