Railway compartment

“ It is true that the railway systems may be united through switches and connecting tracks in physical connection, but this has not been held to justify great monumental structures, extended in their complicated machinery and superficial extent and expense. There is a difference of real substance between such conecting tracks and switches and junctions and a passenger metropolitan union station. ”

“ They are apt to give orders for large entrainments and detrainments to be carried out at any part of the line, regardless of the railway facilities at that point, although perhaps a suitable place is within reasonable distance. Frequently they have been known to countermand their orders for entrainments, heedless of the fact that, once arrangements have been made to concentrate rolling stock on a certain place, it takes time to alter these arrangements, and is sure to cause confusion. ”

“ This is a difficult problem, but when enough big men give it attention it will be solved. It probably means more elasticity, more inter-changeability between train service and the various kinds of maintenance, between the locomotive and the shop, between the railway and allied contiguous industries. ”

“ Block-Telegraph Signalling.—However complete the outdoor signals and interlocking at any station, they can only control the movement of trains within their range, and something more is requisite to ensure the safe working of the traffic over the long lengths of line between stations. For some years a time-interval was allowed for the working of trains following one another on the UP and DOWN lines of a double line railway, no train being allowed to leave a station sooner than a fixed number of minutes after a previous train had started in the same direction. ”

“ The balance is built and operated on private right of way, and goes around, rather than through, the cities. The tracks are standard gauge and of standard railroad construction, were, at the time they were laid, of higher class than those of the Southern Railway Company in the same territory, were intended for handling substantial interchange freight traffic in connection with steam railroads, have the same ruling grades as the latter in the same territory, and are of 80-pound rail. ”

“ In all, 1,500 locomotives, either knocked-down or ready for service, were transported and 20,000 freight cars were taken over in knocked-down parts and erected again at a big assembling station. There were constructed 850 miles of standard gauge railroads for needs which the existing French railways did not meet, of which 500 miles were built in the last five months of the war. In addition, there were constructed 115 miles of light railway, while 140 miles of German light railway were repaired and made fit for operation. ”

“ The growth of the traffic on the principal railways has brought about the necessity of widening or laying down additional lines of rails upon the principal trunk railways, and as this usually involves the purchase of additional land, and more or less interference with public roads and bridges, the operation has to be sanctioned by Parliament very much in the same way as if an absolutely new line of railway were contemplated, although there is not, as a rule, so much serious opposition to be encountered. ”

“ The third-class compartments have windows only in the doors, are innocent of any form of cushions and are generally only divided half-way up. The second and first-class compartments are always much better and will bear comparison with those of the best English railways, whereas the usual third-class compartment is of that primitive type abandoned twenty or more years ago, north of the Channel. ”

“ Unquestionably many of the smaller railways to be amalgamated, though not light railways, need large expenditure for the purpose of duplication of running lines, straightening of curves, stations, stores, and conveniences, and many extensions and cross-lines will also be needed to connect them with the trunk lines, and to open out districts now unprovided with railway facilities. ”

“ The permanent way should be made a thoroughly sound job, as it will then cost but little for repairs. Particulars of what is recommended will be found in Sections III. and IV. I am no advocate of portable railways, which may be well enough for hand trains, or even for horse traction, but a locomotive requires a solid and clean road if it is to work to advantage.
It is often possible to carry a narrow gauge railway by the roadside or, as at Eaton, over pasture lands without the necessity of fencing the line in. ”

“ It is not necessary for us to decide whether an engineer may suddenly and without notice quit the service of a railway company at an intermediate station or between stations, though cases may be easily imagined where a sudden abandonment of a train load of passengers in an unfrequented spot might imperil their safety, and even their lives. ”

“ The findings show that the operation of long trains, that is trains of more than fourteen passenger and more than seventy freight cars, is standard practive over the main lines of the railroads of the United States, and that, if the length of trains is to be regulated at all, national uniformity in the regulation adopted, such as only Congress can prescribe, is practically indispensable to the operation of an efficient and economical national railway system. ”

“ These scattered bits of road here and there were, in after years, as the possibilities of railroad development began to dawn upon the minds of far-seeing men, united by connecting links and reorganized into roads of much greater length. In fact some of the most difficult features of the railroad problem of the present day grew out of the failure of projectors of railroads{435} in the early days to grasp the meaning of the system which they were instituting. France, Germany, Belgium and other European cities have had no serious railway problem. ”

“ To meet our larger needs, it is necessary to establish terminals outside the towns for the change of engines and for our great storage warehouses. Our great railway construction in France, apart from a few cut-off lines, is in the way of storage yards. We have practically the use of two trunk-line tracks. The French run over them, too, for there is a tremendous civil population to be supported. The French are necessarily supreme, and we simply have the right to run over their railroads subject to their rules. ”

“ On a working railway, the train service must be kept going, irrespective of renewals, and very often the best that can be done is to reduce the double line to single line working at the site of the operations. It is not always expedient or possible to make a temporary bridge and diverted line for traffic purposes, as the expenditure to be incurred might be too great to warrant the outlay, or there may be local difficulties to effectually prevent the introduction of a provisional structure. ”

“ Prompt loading and unloading of freight-cars is one way in which owners of freight can conserve railway service and in the long run help themselves.
The conservation of railway service has yet larger aspects. The moving of a freight-car from the place of shipment to its destination is the duty of the railway company, but it cannot perform that duty without adequate facilities. ”

“ Where there are only two lines of rails to serve for the UP and DOWN service of a heavy passenger and goods traffic, it is imperative to restrict those lines as much as possible to the actual transit of trains, and not to block them by unnecessary occupation for shunting purposes. A goods train running a long distance collects waggons from many roadside stations, and at some of them several waggons will be taken on, to be forwarded to various and widely distant destinations. ”

“ At places where there was special need for taking precautionary measures, detachments of the corps were stationed in readiness for immediate action, while on important lines of railway Federals and Confederates alike had, at each end thereof, construction trains loaded with every possible requisite, the locomotives attached to them keeping their steam up in order that the trains could be started off instantly on the receipt of a telegram announcing a further interruption of traffic. ”

“ In practice the regulating authorities have been forced to adopt a middle ground with, perhaps, a tendency to lean more toward preventing an unreasonably high return to the strong than an unreasonably low return to the weak. An attempt has been made to meet this problem in the Transportation Act which provides for the ultimate elimination of the weak railways by consolidation with the strong. The Commission is ordered to prepare and adopt a plan for the consolidation of railway properties into a limited number of systems. ”

“ Even when wagons had been unloaded, they were too often left on the lines, in long trains of empties, instead of being sent where they were most needed. Each railway company disposed of its own rolling stock independently of the other companies, adopting the view that it had no concern with what was happening elsewhere. In some instances special trains were dispatched for the conveyance of a few hundred men or a few hundredweights of stores. ”

“ Those who could sit up in the ordinary cars were conveyed in them. Those who could not sit up, or would be injured by so doing, were carried to the railway, by hand, on the mattresses or stretchers they had occupied in the hospitals to which they had first been taken. At the station the mattresses were placed on thick layers of straw or hay strewn over the floors of the freight cars in which supplies had been brought to the front. Large window spaces were cut in the sides or ends of the cars to provide for ventilation. ”

“ Along such lines there always had been large traffic, and it was no doubt greatly stimulated by the facilities which the new mode of locomotion afforded for its expansion. But as fresh railways were completed, and as the capital invested in them increased, the profits receded. Even at the present time, with larger receipts per mile than have ever been taken, the position of railway investment is almost from every point of view, unsatisfactory. ”

“ No station to be constructed, and no siding to join a passenger line, on a steeper gradient than 1 in 260, except where it is unavoidable. When the line is double, and the gradient at a station or siding-junction is necessarily steeper than 1 in 260, and when danger is to be apprehended from vehicles running back, a catch-siding with points weighted for the siding, or a throw-off switch, to be provided to intercept runaway vehicles at a distance outside the home-signal for the ascending line, greater than the length of the longest train running upon the line. ”

“ They are all mounted on carriage springs, and have grease boxes, spring buffers, and every other device in use on the London and North-Western Railway—from which they have been copied, like everything else on this Liliputian line. The greatest railway in the world took a friendly interest in the smallest, and supplied it with the drawings and models from which it and its rolling stock have been imitated. ”

“ It is, however, apparent that the parcel service so far as interchange is concerned, can never be efficiently performed for the public until railway companies co-operate through the clearing house, to improve their arrangements for parcel traffic. Looking at the extent to which the railway system has now reached, we consider that the time has arrived when railway companies should combine to devise some rapid and efficient system for the delivery of parcels. ”

“ The originators of the Act did not define what a Light Railway really is, but they evidently had in their minds, inter alia, that railways, unrestricted by Board of Trade regulations as to fencing, sidings, gradients, and permanent stations, should be permitted to run along the high roads, acting as feeders to the existing lines, to the benefit of the small towns, villages, and farms near which they passed. ”

“ It would be well that our railway engineers should inform themselves more fully on the subject, as otherwise their valuable assistance, which would insure that narrow-gauge railways were constructed in a solid and reliable manner, will be thrust on one side by the requirements of the times, and the work will be wholly in the hands of the many manufacturers of narrow-gauge plant, whose designs, being chiefly of what is known as the portable class, are, for the most part, ill adapted for permanent locomotive traffic. ”

“ And I believe also that, considering the absence of most of the causes of accidents, there will even be less liability of interruption and less delay in the average resulting from accidents than in the ordinary double locomotive railway.
By the modification of the gradients and by reducing the curves to 1,000 feet radius where any great advantage can be gained by so doing, and by constructing the cuttings, embankments, tunnels, and viaducts for a single line, a considerable saving may be effected in the first cost. ”

“ The system of cast-iron railways is as yet to be considered but in its infancy. It will be found to be an immense improvement on the common road, and also on the wooden railway. It neither presents the friction of the tram-way, nor partakes of the perishable nature of the wooden railway, and, as regards utility, it may be considered as the medium between the navigable canal and the common road. We may therefore hope that as this system develops itself, our roads will be laid out as much as possible on one level, and in connection with the great lines of communication throughout the country. ”