The Sun.
London, England, 1846-09-03 00:00:00

INCREASE OF FARES ON THE

SOUTH-EASTERN LINE.
On Tuesday the South-Eastern Company raised their
passenger fares to an extent varying from ten to forty per
cent.—an admission, notwithstanding all that has been
officially said to the contrary, that low fares have failed,
in the county of Kent.
The circumstances under which the reduction and in-
crease have taken place are of so singular a character,
and public convenience and accommodation are so mixed
up in the matter, that a brief notice of them becomes a
public duty.
Railway companies are induced to reduce their fares
by one or two convictions, viz., that it will produce an
increase of receipts as well as of the number of passen-
gers ; or that it Kill what is termed drive an opponent
out of the field, or, in other words, enable them success-
fully to contend in Parliament against a competing line.
In both cases the result must be interesting and instruc-
tive to the community. Without desiring to say by
which of these motives the South-Eastern Company
were actuated, we shall give the old and new fares, and
then briefly state a few facts connected with the re-
duction and the increase.

The following is a list of the fares as they were and as
hey now are :

Ist Class. 2d Class. 3d Class. Increase
s. d. s. d. s. d. per cent.
Reigate; old .. 4 4 2 6 1 4
7
„ new 4 0 3 0 1 9
Tunbridge, old 6 6 4 0 2 6
tALlUliUblo 7 0 a gg
new 8 6 6 6 3 10
Maidstone, old
„ new 9 0 6 6 4 0
Canterbury, old
' new l5 0 11 0 6 9
Ramsgate,' old
, new .. 18 0 13 6 8 1 14
Folkestone, old
27 new
Dover, old l5 0 10 0 6 0 16
„ new
It will be recollected that at the termination of the
session of 1844 it was known that a very strong contest
would take place in the session just closed for competing
lines through North and Mid Kent.
In September, 1845, the South-Eastern Company re-
duced their fares, and in a very elaborate official state-
ment of " the position and projects of the South-Eastern
Company" it was asserted that by this reduction " a
great benefit had been conferred on the public without
any loss being sustained by the Company."
At the South-Eastern Company's half-yearly meeting
in March last, the directors in their report stated—
"On the Ist of September last the directors carried
into effect a great reduction of fares, and adopted the
system of granting day tickets, and the directors have
much satisfaction in stating that these measures have
had the effect they anticipated."

At that meeting the Chairman (Mr. M‘Gregor) also
said, " I beg leave to congratulate you on the state of
your affairs, which must be highly satisfactory to you.
You are all aware that the resolution of the directory for
reducing the fares came into operation on the Ist of
September, and the result to which we looked forward
has been attained."

It will be seen that these assertions of the directors
and chairman, that the experiment of the reduction of
fares had proved successful, were made seven months
after it had been. in operation.

In Parliament this reduction of fares was marle one
of the chief grounds on which the South• Eastern claimed
a sort of right to make a North Kent as well as a Mid
Kent line.

In the statement put in before Group 14 by the South-
Eastern Company, in the session just closed, they say:—
" Recently they have carried the reduction of fares,
previously low, still further, and have gone to great
expense in placing their locomotive establishment on
the best footing, and in laying down the electric telegraph.
" Under these circumstances they feel that there
would be a hardship in giving a preference to other cons-
penies, the establishment of which would not be of any
peculiar advantage to the public, but would inflict serious
injury on the South-Eastern Company."
In fact, no one doubts, that much of the strength of
the Parliamentary ease of the South-Eastern Company
arose out of the reduction which has just been done
away with, and from the belief that it had proved remu-
nerative, and that it would, as a consequence, be a per-
manent reduction.

The questions that the public have a right to ask and
have answered are—let. Were the directors and chair-
man mistaken when they stated the experiment of the
reduction of fares had proved a successful one ; and if
not, why have they raised the fares when the receipts
have gone on continually increasing from the time they
declared the reduction of fares had proved remunera-
tive? Is it that the Canterbury and Ramsgate branch
is not remunerative, and that an increased receipt over
141 miles, is less remunerative than the old receipt over
113 miles? Or was the reduction made, not in good
faith, but for Parliamentary purposes? Our readers
have the short facts of the case before them, and can
judge for themselves.

The peculiar feature in the South-Eastern line is its
circuitous character. Dover by road is 72 miles, by rail
it is 88; Canterbury by road is 56, by rail 82; Maid-
stone by road is 33, but by rail it is 56; Ramsgate is by
road 72, and by rail 97k. The principle admitted by
the South-Eastern Company in its Parliamentary
struggle, as well as in their reduction of fares in
September last year, was that the passenger should be
charged—as between London and Peterborough—for
direct distances. This principle is based on the simple
proposition that if certain towns served by very circuitous
lines are offered a direct line, with fares at the same
rate per mile as those charged by the longer one, such
towns may justly call upon the company having the
circuitous railway to charge them for direct distances
only. Because the legislature chose to sanction a
roundabount instead of a straight line through
Kent, it does not follow that the public can be
justly required to pay for as well as to travel and lose
time over some unnecessary 23 miles in 56, which is
now the case in travelling between London and Maid-
stone by the South-Eastern line. The argument that
the South-Eastern Company cannot, with profit to itself,
carry passengers 56 miles round to Maidstone and charge
them for the distance by road, is a good and valid and
very reasonable argument when urged before South-
li proprietors, but it is of no force to the people of
Maidstone, nor to those who wish to travel to that place,
when responsible persons go before Parliament, and offer
to construct a direct line to Maidstone, and to insert a
clause in their Act binding them to carry passengers to
and fro at a rate below the sum that was levied by the
South- Eastern when that Company charged over tfie direct
distance only. Theexcess of fare which the principle now
in operation on the Dover line, of charging for circuitous
distances, occasions will be Seen from the following
figures ;—Tunbridge is thirty-two miles by road, and
the third-class passenger. if charged according to the
Parliamentary restriction, would pay 2s. Bd. ; but be-
cause he is compelled to he an additional half-hour on
his journey in order to get over the circuitous nine miles,
he is charged 3s. 5d., or about thirty pet cent. beyond
the ordinary third-class charge. Canterbury is fifty-six
miles by the road, and the charge by a direct line of rail
would be 4s. 81, whereas the South-Eastern Company
now charge 6s. 9d., or between forty and fifty per cent.
• for the elbow route. Ramsgate is seventy-two miles by