The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-11-15 00:00:00

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ad to afford very great

, advantages to the market peopleand towns.
In fine weather respectable tradespeople, clerks, &c., avail
themselves of the third-class carriages to a considerable
extent; but the great bulk of the half million of third-class
passengers who are carried on this railway in the course of
the year are strictly the working classes, weavers, masons,
bricklayers, carpenters, mechanics, and labourers of every
description, some of whom used formerly to travel by carts,
but the greater number on foot.
The fare from Manchester to London by railway and
steam-boat, via Hull, is 1415.; and many of the labouring
classes avail themselves of this mode of conveyance, especially
during summer.
In the case of such a line as the Manchester and Leeds,
there can be little doubt that the railway has been a great
advantage to the poorer classes, and it may be expected that
the interest of the directors will induce them to afford every
facility for the developement of an extensive third-class
traffic. But upon the long lines, which form the main lines
of communication with the metropolis, and upon which there
is a great thorough traffic, the case is very different, and the
number of third-class passengers is inconsiderable. The
whole number, for instance, of third-class passengers carried
on the London and Birmingham and Grand Junction Rail-
ways, between London, Manchester, and Liverpool, is less
than the number carried by the Arbroath and Forfar Rail-
way, and not a seventh part of the number carried between
Newcastle and North Shields.

Upon these lines it may be questionable whether the in-
terest of the proprietors will ever induce them to encourage
the developement of a large third-class traffic. It is satis-
factory, however, to find that there is a growing disposition
among railway companies, thus circumstanced, to afford the
accommodation of at least one train a day by which the
poorer classes may be conveyed at reduced fares. It is
stated that the result of the experiment of running a third-
class train upon the London and Birmingham Railway has
been very satisfactory, the persons who have availed them-
selves of it having been, with few exceptions, of a class who
could not have afforded to pay second-class fares ; and it is
expected that the number of this class of passengers will
greatly increase when the advantages to be derived from the
great saving of time are more generally known. It is right,
however, to observe that the advantage to the third-class
passengers in point of time is often not so great as might be
anticipated, where the links of communication are formed
by distinct lines. For instance, third-class passengers from
London to Manchester or Liverpool are detained at Bir-
mingham from three in the afternoon till six next morning.
It is very desirable that, in such cases, arrangements should
be made for securing to the public the same advantages
which they would have had if the whole line of railway com-
munication had been one undertaking, and under one
management.—Times.