The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-28 00:00:00

ME COST OF RAILWAYS.

A railway director, in a letter to the Tinges says:
Will you permit me to say a few words with refe-
rence to your leading article of this day respecting
the cost of railways in England?
Allow me to state, in the first instance, that the
comparison of the pecuniary results to the share-
holders of the railways in France and England
is not a fair one, not merely on the very
limited grounds which you have alluded
to, but to a vastly greater extent—for this
reason. The railways in France have been made,
to a very great extent, with public money, on which
the State draws no dividend. The land, I think,
has been given—certainly all the earthworks
have been constructed, at the cost of the Govern-
ment. The shareholders have merely laid the
permanent way, built the stations (even of this I
am not sure), and stocked the line. Over and above
this (I write from memory) large subventions have
been given by the State to some, at least, of the
companies—to the Eastern of France from four to
six millions sterling. It is no wonder, therefore,
that the French lines pay a larger dividend upon a
part only of the capital necessary to construct them
than the English companies on the whole cost of
their respective railways.
Again, in France only the great arterial lines
are even as yet completed, and few others even com-
menced. French passengers and goods, therefore,
have in many instances very considerable distance
to travel before they reach the railway leading to
Paris or their seaports ; yet it is for their advan-
tage to cross the country to the railways, which
thus get all the traffic which in England is divided
between many lines. In England, so to speak,
almost all the cross roads are now of iron. It is no
wonder, therefore, that the aggregate dividends are
small; but, though the shareholders are in conse-
quence not so well off as the French, the advantage
to English trade over that of France arising from
the difference in the two cases is almost incalcul-
able. The whole community has profited enor-
mously (many shareholders, especially if also land-
holders or manufacturers, included), though indivi-
duals have been losers. In France, also, there is no
competition between arterial lines. If a French-
man wishes to go to Marseilles or Bordeaux, there
is but one railway to each place. An Englishman
going to Edinburgh or to Exeter has his choice of
two, almost equally direct. It is no wonder, there-
fore, that the French shareholder gets a better
dividend. England might have had something of
this benefit if Sir Robert Peel had not, most un-
happily, upset Lord Dalhousie's wise scheme.
Again, the administrators of the French railways
are not in the same manner or degree under the con-
trol of public opinion as English directors. The
former, consequently, are able to run comparatively
few passenger trains, and all who wish to travel
must either use those few trains, however inconve-
nient the hours of starting or arrival, or stay at
home. The Englishman demands one or two trains
before breakfast, and as many after—one to get
him to town to luncheon, and another to take him
home in time for dinner. I need hardly say that
this circumstance greatly increases the comparative
expenses of English railways. This latter argument
as well as those regarding arterial lines, applies
equally to the German and English railways ; and
I believe that many of these also have either re-
ceived direct pecuniary aid from the State, or have
had substantial money's worth from it in the shape
of facilities and general countenance.
The English Government, on the contrary, and
more especially Parliament, have acted almost uni-
formly the part of a hard stepmother towards the
railways. There are no Parliamentary expenses in
France. And as to the Government itself, what do
you think of the Chester and Holyhead Railway
Company (to give an example) being compelled to
pay the Crown for the chips of a greenstone, as
bard as granite, which it cut out of the bowels of
a Welsh mountain to form a tunnel through it, as
if it had been quarrying for a profit
Then, as to expenses, no doubt there has been ex-
travagance, and solicitors, engineers, and Parlia-
mentary barristers have made large fortunes out of
railway capital. But those who have had the ma-
nagement of railways are by no means responsible
for all the excessive cost at which English lines
have been made. Parliament has much of this cost
to answer for, and landholders still more. The threat
of Parliamentary opposition has often compelled
the projectors of English railways to give for land
many times what it was really worth. It has been
a matter of calculation. "So many extra days be-
fore a committee will cost £—." Lord A or 'Squire
B demands £5,000 for land which is not worth
£2,000, and the disproportion is often far greater.
Is it cheaper to give him the money than to pay
the expenses of the additional days, which expenses
are too often an " unknown quantity ?"
Talk as men may of the iniquities of railway
1 speculators, I will undertake to show that land-
holders have been at least as rapacious and unscru-
pulous. Not to mention the case of a late Essex
peer, in whose footsteps Mr. Labouchere (Lord
Taunton) refused to follow, I could tell you of cases
where landholders, anxious to get a line made to
benefit their estates, have agreed to take simple
agricultural value, as it is called, of their land. But
when the course of the line has been irrevocably
settled by act'of Parliament, they have found out
that it runs 200 or 300 yards to the right or left of
the plan originally shown to them ; and on the
strength of this trifling discrepancy, though the
new line was equally beneficial to their estates as
the old one, and did as little mischief by severance
or otherwise, they have repudiated their engage-
ment, and demanded and extorted extravagant
prices for their land.
Then Parliament has compelled the railways to
pay the vendor's costs as well as those of their own
solicitors. You bid directors of new railways to
eschew legal expenses ; but how are they to pur-
chase land without paying two sets of attorneys,
whose bills it would make you shudder to behold?
As to the cost of accidents, by all means let the
railway company pay all damages occasioned by
wilful neglect or carelessness; but if Englishmen_
insist on travelling 40 miles an hour, instead
_ of
20 or 30, as in France and Germany, I do n
that the whole blame, or the whole cost, of h
7dt think
should be borne by those whom they virtually com-
pel to carry them at such a pace.
cases of acci-
I will only add that that inva.luabilne institution, a
British jury, so invariably decides
companies, that
I dent against the unhappyrailwaypay an unreasonable
t they are generally too glad to
e rather than have still
sum by way of compronns
damages inflicted upon
more exorbitant costs and
tl.vam by a verdict.