The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-04-02 00:00:00

RIVAL RAILWAYS BETWEEN CARLISLE
- AND rSLASGOW.

To the EDlTOROfthe,767.l,:th6 "GLASGOW HERALD:"
SIR,—Will any of your readers, who posses the requi-
site information, have the goodness to answer the fol-
lowing questions?—

Ist: Is it true, as is currently reported, that, of the long
array of respectable parties who appear as forming the
Provisional Committee of the " Caledonian Railway," not
one of those connected with Glasgow has taken, or means
to take, a single Share in the undertaking?
2d. Is it true, as is currently reported, that the names
of some of these pal-ties were put down in the List with..
out their authority—while others were put down in con-
sequence of permission obtained two years ago, under
different circumstances ?

3d. Is it true, as is currently reported, that some of the
most influential of these parties have, since the publica-
tion of the Prospectus, withdrawn their names—deter-
mined not to allow themselves to be made the means of
decoying others to subscribe to an undertaking in which
they themselves have taken no Shares, and of the merits
of which, as compared with othtr Lines, they as yet know
little or nothing?
4th. Is it true that the plans of the " Caledonian" Line
deposited last year, in terms of the standing orders of
Parliament, passed over, not along the Wishaw and Colt-
ness Railway, and in place of reaching Glasgow by the
Garnkirk Railway, as seems now contemplated, joined the
Pollok and Govan Coal Railway—which passes down the
surface of West-street, and terminates on the surface of
the Paisley Turnpike Road at Tradeston ?
sth. Is it true that the Table of comparative distances
now published, with the Prospectus of the Caledonian
Railway, refers entirely to the difference between the
" Caledonian" and the " North British" or East Coast
Line, and makes no mention of the " Gl*w, Dumfries,
and Carlisle," or West Coast Line—an oat the length
of the Caledonian is stated as being the same as the Cen-
tral Line reported on by the Parliamentary Commission-
ers in I 842; while, if now brought over the Wilsontown,
Wishaw arid Coltness, Monkland and Kirkintilloch, and
Garnkirk Mineral Lines (as is talked of), it will be much
longer ?

6th. Is it true that these four mineral lines, over which
in succession it is proposed to carry the whole English
traffic with Glasgow, are many of them of a very imper-
fect construction—of only 4 feet 6 inches guage—crowded
with coal and ironstone waggons—in some places having
only a single line of rails—of a weight not exceeding
50 lbs. per lineal yard—crossing several important turn-
pike roads near Glasgow on the level—and having their
terminus at Glasgow 120 feet at least above the general
level of the city ?
7th. Is it true, as is reported to have been stated at the
public meeting held not long ago at Lanark, that the
riding gradient of the Caledonian line will be 1 in 75,
and that for many consecutive miles ; and is it true that
the length of new line to be made will be 112 miles (be-
sides the expenditure required for the alteration and com-
pletion of the Mineral Railways, while the ruling gradient
of the Glasgow, Dumfries, and Carlisle Line, will be 1 in
130, and the length of new Line 92 miles ?
Bth. Is it true that the natural summit of the Caledo-
nian Line is upwards of 1000 feet, and of the Glasgow,
Dumfries, and Carlisle Line only 600 feet above the sea ?
9th. Is it true that the alleged subscription towards the
Capital Stock of this undertaking, by the North of Eng-
land Railways, to the extent (as is said) of £600,000, is
only in expectancy, and that in not one of these Compa-
nies have the Shareholders yet been called together to say
whether they will, or will not, so subscribe ?
Categorical answers to these plain questions will enable
the public, especially at a distance, to understand whether
this undertaking has the real support of the respectable
parties in Scotland, under whose auspices it has been
ushered before the public, and what confidence is to be
placed in the vague statements of its merits contained in
the Prospectus.

I am, Sir,