, 1876-03-15
T AVIS"
IS PUBLISHED
RvBRY WEDNESDAY N SATURDAY..
ELECTRICITY AND RAILWAY
TRAVELLING.
(From the Times.)

At q late weekly evening meeting OF the
Royal Institution, England, a paper "On
the Applications Of Electricity to the Pro-
lection of Life on Railways" was read by
Mr.. W. H. Preece, NJ. R. I, NJ. inst. G. E.,
and one Of the Divisional Engineers of the
Postal Telegraph system. Mr.. Preece set
out by proposing to establish three prOpo-
sitions-viz., !, that railway travelling is
dangerous 2, that railway travelling is
safe and, 3, that the danger is potential,
and the safety actual and that the one
has been converted into the other by the
operation of scientific thought, and by the
application Of scientific skill. The %lectur-
er regarded the first proposition as self
evident, and scarcely calling for proof
q view Of the case which, u~nhappily. has
been brought home to very many persons
during the past twelve months. AS re-
garded the second proposition, the lecturer
adduced some very interesting statistics,
showing that in proportion to the total
number Of persons who met with violent
deaths, only a small number were killed
on railways. Thus, in 1878, 1926 per-
sons in England and Wales met with
deaths of this description, being an average
OF $50 per 1000, 900, or one in 1854 of
the whole population. OF these, less than
1900. c., only about 8 per cent.-met
with their deaths through accidents on
railways. Objection might, perhaps, be
taken to the comparison on the ground
that, for the purposes of the paper, the
figures should only have included the
number of persons killed in the act of
travelling-whether by road, rail, river,
or at seQ-and should not have extended
to such forms of violent death as injuries
in mines, mechanical injuries of various
kinds, asphyxia, and other forms of So
called +" unclassifed violence" A subse-
quent table, however, placed the matter
on a more ineligible basis as regards the
relative safety Of railway travelling to the
number of journeys made, and the number
of passengers carried. Thus, in the three
years ending 1649, one passenger was
killed from causes beyond his WI control
for every 4,782,168 journeys made; for
the four years ending 1859, the proportion
was one passenger to 8,7O8,411 journeys
made; for the same period ending ten
years later the proportion was reduced
TO one passenger for about $4,000, 900
journeys; and for the three years ending
1878, The proportion had fallen to one
passenger for upwards of 10000, 900
Journeys. Taking the average length of
each journey at 10 miles, one passenger is
killed, from causes beyond his W con-
troll, for every 200, 896, 900 miles travelled,
so that if a person travelled 10 hours a
day, at the rate of 80 miles an hour for
each of the 365 days of the year, he would
probably be killed in 1885 years. Dur
ing the four years ended 1874, an average
of 104 persons were killed on railways
from causes within their w control, as
compared with an average of Al killed by
the fault of the railway companies, so
that it would appear that these companies
are, in reality, more mindful of the lives
of their passengers than the passengers
are Of their W lives. OF passengers
killed by their WI negligence during
1874, it would appear that by far the
largest number-49-sufered death from
falling between the carriages and the
platforms; and that these two causes
getting outlof or into trains in motion and
crossing the lines at stations-are response
bic fof nearly one-half OF the whole number