The Progress., 1893-07-29
ENGLIsA TRAVEL EXPENSIVE.

WHY Upscs by Rail Tor Passengers and
Ircirht Arc So High.
The omiucnt English railway au-
thority. Mr.. William NJ. Acworth,
points out many causes for t"o diff
ference between railways in his
country and the United Satcs. I'm tho
Engineering Magazine Tho higher
ratio of charges ON English roads arc
thus explained:
Tho very largo capital outlay Of
English railways is of course ono
main reason Of the high standard of
rates and iarcs i'm England. Exactly
how high that standard Is We hayo
no means of knowing. for our railway
statistics. made up in n form that
was laid down 10y act of parliament
about thirty years back, carefully
suppress the information that IT, is
most necessary for us to have.
Ton mlcs and passenger miles are
not hcro recorded. We know that
each ton of goods carried pays the
railways ON the average about sixty
cents If We guess that the average
distance is about twenty-five miles,
we arrive at an average rate of 10
cents per ton-milc. which is not very
far from thrcc times the average rate
in tho United States. 50 that i'm case
of passengers We may guess that the
average faro il about 10 cents per
milo. which. though lower than tho
American average. is higher than i'm
any European country. such re-
suit is far FROM satisfactory. High
cost Of construction might have ju-ti-
fled high range of rates and fares at
the outset. but year by year tho trallic
pcr milo Of limo opcu increases In
density. and yet the goods rates hard
ly como down at all in tho last year
or two thcir tendency has boon all
the other way - while tho paG-
scugcr fares only come down worry
slowly.
And yet the explanation is not far
60 sccl Our services have always
boon expensive to work; thcy are be-
coming moro expensive" year 10y year.
In America train-loads are mainly
limited by the capacity of the engines
ours by tho weight Of goods or
number of passengers that have had
time to accumulate in the worry short
interval between one train and an
other. Lot me illustrate: II man
~ sailing from Now York to Europe.
no will choose his favorto line or hIs
favorito boat. regardless of the time
of day or day of tho week ut which it
starts. On tho other hand. If tho
Manhattan elevated wcro to try to
run its trains only once in ten min
utcs in the slack hours Of tho day
the street cars would rob il of tho
bulk Of its passengers
Now. in England our business is
all between places which in America
would be regarded as close together.
We call Manchester "the north OF
England" yet Manchester is only
four and ono-half hours from London.
Consequently there must be trains
between the two points at all hours
of tho day, to suit the convenience
of pas&SBgers wanting TO go at any
time. Consequently, too, each train
runs with very much less than n
train load of passengers. Then these
trains must DO run at high rate of
spcSd, for though "a few minutes more
or less arc of little importance in
journey Of u hundred miles, a quarter
of an hour out of four hours is n very
considerable percentage. High speed
means few stops, and few stops mean
additional trains TO serve the second
class stations Then high speed and
frequent Expresses for passengers
mean high speed and short trains for
good-that Is half-loadod engines;
for an engine loaded TO its full ca
pacity moves so slowly ly-Occupies
the line. that is. for so long period
that it is impossible TO find room
for il.
But IL would not be truo Co say
that the goods are worked Mt high
speed simply for the convenience OF
the railway management, On the
contrary. the demand for speed in the
case of merchandise traffic is fully
abreast OF that in tho case of pass
ongors. Broadly. IL may bo said
that the English goods-servico is
based on tho supposition that, be-
tween important towns at least.
whatever is handed TO tho railway
company at the forwarding station
over night will bo delivered to tho
consignee tho FIRST thing next morn
ing. Now. n service such as this, in
the nature of things can never be q
cheap one.
old Him the Reason.