The Sun.
London, England, 1860-08-31 00:00:00

STREET RAILWAYS:

Birkenhead witnessed -yesterday the formal in-
auguration of an undertaking which in this coun-
try wears all the asped of novelty. In New York,
'Boston, Philadelphia, and the chief towns of the
United States, street railways—the chemin de jer
dmericain of the French, but better known in
England under the designation of horse tramways,
have for some years been established. To the suc-
cess of the experiment in those places in which it
has been tried, the testimony of not only the most
eminent American engineers, but of intelligent
travellers from all par is of the world, has been un-
hesitatingly borne. Encouraged by that success,
attempts have from time to time been made to in-
troduce the system into our own metropolis, in the
hope of thus remedying the serious inconvenience
in its main thoroughfares which is daily caused by
an overgrown traffic. A company was formed, and
bills were brought before Parliament with that ob-
ject. Deputations waited on Sir B. Hall and Lord
John Manners, -when they were at the head
of the Department of Public Works, with
a view to its accomplishment. The choked up
streets of London made a silent appeal for some
such change. It was all in vain. Objections to
the scheme were raised on every side. It was con-
tended that it would be utterly impossible to lay
down on macadamized roads the iron plates or rails
on which new conveyances would have to run so as
to render it certain that they would be kept on a
level with the surface ; that, as a consequence, the
lighter description of vehicles running diagonally
against the plates would be liable to have their
wheels torn off, and that the frequent occurrence of
serious accidents must inevitably be the result. It
was, moreover, argued in opposition to the scheme
that the proposed tramways would interfere with
the necessary repair of the streets in which they
happened to be laid down, and that in those cases
in which such repair could no longer be postponed
portions of the rails would have to be taken up, so
that the traffic along the whole line might thus
for days or even weeks be brought to a stand-
still. The supporters of the contrary view ap-
pealed to experience. They pointed with confi-
dence to that which had already been effected.
They drew a vivid picture of the miseries which an
unhappy pedestrian in search of an omnibus to
convey him home has to encounter on a wet day
in London. They represented him as peering im-
patiently in a particular direction, in the futile en-
deavour to distinguish among a crowd of some
dozen other vehicles the object—be it named
" Tally-ho," or " Paragon," or " Royal Blue"—of
his devout expectation. At length it draws near.
He hails the conductor, but alas ! the curt response,
" Full inside, sir," dooms him to a walk of some
10 or 15 minutes more through rain and mud.
Fortunate might he consider himself if at the end
of that time he could secure a place in an omnibus
-which would bear him to his destination, although
in doing so he might have to endure the by no
means pleasant regards of some 10 or 11 other pas-
sengers as he forced his way by them, to their
great inconvenience, to the further end of the
vehicle and squeezed himself into a seat. Such
were the colours in which our present system of
street conveyance was depicted by the advocates of
reform. They contrasted with such a state of things
large and roomy carriages gliding rapidly and with
an equable motion over little stripes of iron, and
constructed on such a scale as to afford ample ac-
commodation, with the utmost facility of ingress
and egress for nearly three times the number of
passengers which an ordinary omnibus contains.
They talked of making travelling through the
streets of London a positive luxury, instead of, as
it is in all the great thoroughfares, a tedious and
disagreeable process. The picture was a sufficiently
inviting one to make thousands wish for its realisa-
tion, bat then, strongly in opposition to that wish,
rose prejudice and the fear of innovation. In
this position the question of the construction of
tramways in the metropolis, as well as in
our chief towns, has stood for some time.
It remained for a citizen of the United
States to infuse renewed hope into the supporters
of the scheme. To Mr. G. F. Train, of Boston, the
introduction into England of street railways is
mainly to be attributable. But five short months
have elapsed since he laid the proposals on the sub-
ject before the Commissioners of Birkenhead. Two
months later found those proposals accepted. Yes-
terday saw them carriedinto practical effect. Nor
was the undertaking inaugurated with a success at
all inferior to the expedition with which the neces-
sary works had been completed. The line of rails
—which has been laid down under the superinten-
dence of Mr. Polies, of Philadelphia, and Mr.
Samuel, of London, and whicirreflects no inconside-
rable degree of credit on the professional skill which
has been exhibited in its construction—extends
from the Wc)odside Ferry, the landing place at Bir-
kenhead, jrat opposite the centre of Liverpool, by
the Shote-road, through Angle and Conway streets,
and so on to the entrance to Birkenhead Park.
The whole distance is little more than a mile and
a quarter; it is, however, quite sufficient to enable
those who take an interest in the subject to form
a good idea of the merits of Mr. Train's
experiment. A junction in Conway-street
enables the carriages to return from the park
by Hamilton street to the point from which they
originally started.
Nothing can well be less complicated than the
machinery which is employed for the accomplish-
ment of this double journey. The tramway itself
consists simply of two iron plates, each being raised
about an inch on the outer side, and running pa-
rallel to one another, as in the caseof the rails on an
ordinary railroad. They are fixed upon longitudinal
bearers, which rest upon transverse sleepers, and
are so let into the street as to run completely on a
level with its surface. They do not, therefore, in-
terfere in the slightest degree with the ordinary
traffic. To ply on these iron plates carriages capable
each of affording abundant accommodation to from
50 to 60 passengers have been built by Mr. Main,
of Birkenhead. They are more than double the
size of an ordinary omnibus, are somewhat similar
in shape, and are provided underneath with
wheels like those of a railway carriage, but
somewhat smaller iu size. The plan upon
which they are constructed would ap-
pear to be exceedingly well adapted to street traffic.
Each carriage is 24 ft. long by 7 ft wide; 7 ft being
also the height of the interior from floor to roof. It
furnishes sitting room for 24 persons inside and as
many more outside, for whose protection a handrail
runs round the top. A space of two or three feet
intervenes between the passengers on each side of
the interior, and this it is proposed to turn to ac-
count by allowing passengers to stand there in the
event of all the seats being occupied; handrails,
with guiding 'straps attached, being run beneath
the roof for their convenience. It is more than
questionable, however, whether it is expedient to
permit the centres of the carriages to be thus filled
up, and one of the chief advantages—that of ample
accommodation—which they are calculated to con-
fer, as a consequence neutralised. A small platform
at each end of each carriage, raised about a foot and
a half from the ground, and separated from the
horses—which may be yoked to either end—by a
contrivance somewhat resembling the splashboard
of a hansom cab, affords the means of ready ingress
and egress to the new conveyances on whose deco-
ration as well as on whose adaptation to the com-
fort and security of passengers great pains have
evidently been bestowed. They are nevertheless
fitted up in a style more luxurious than taste-
ful. Gaudy colouring has in their case been
sot:uevehat too freely employed. This, however,
is a fault which may be easily remedied, and
which by no means detracts from their usefulness.
It may in some instances offend the eye, but it can
hardly fail to be lost sight of in that pleasant sense
of freedom from squeezing and crushing in which
our present system of street conveyance will so
rarely permit us to indulge. In the construction
of the new carriages the important question of ven-
tilation, it is but right to add, has not been nee
glected. Each has its sliding windows, with
"louvres," to prevent a draught. Each is provided
also with a driver and conductor, both of whom
have it in their power to control, by means of a
patent break, the machinery by which the progress
of the carriages is stopped or retarded.
Such is the system of street conveyance which
yesterday began its career at Birkenhead. As a

mere spectacle its inauguration possessed no parti-
cular attraction. Shortly before 10 o'clock two of
the new carriages were drawn out from the depot
in Canning-street and placed upon the line. At 11
two horses were yoked to each, and they proceeded
on their way well freighted with passengers, glid-
ing along the rails at the rate of about four miles
an hour—a rate of speed which might without dif-
ficulty be increased to six or seven miles an hour—
smoothly and uninterruptedly, turning one or two
extremely sharp curves with the utmost facility,
and landing their passengers at their several desti-
nations in security. They continued throughout
the day to ply for hire with a success which must
have gladdened the hearts of the proprietors, and
their progress was, at different points along the
route, watched by some hundreds of spectators.
On the whole nothing could to all appearance be
more successful than this experiment of Mr. Train's
on British soil. That he will be equally successful
in the similar undertaking on which he is about to
enter in Manchester, Glasgow, and
some more of
our large towns, there seems a. t the first blush to be
no reason to doubt. Many of the objections which
have been hitherto urged against
of street railways into this country the trial at Bir-
kenhead can scarcely fail to do something to obvi-
ate. With the result of that trial before him, no
one can fairly contend that they operate as impedi-
ments to ordinary traffic, inasmuch as the tramway

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