Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-12-22

to the substitution
of electricity for
steam in their business as a necessity of
the immediate future. In fact, roads are
in process of construction and gigantic
plants are being erected for the employ
ment of this new means of propulsion.
The pioneer enterprise of this description,
connecting Chicago with st. Louis prom
ises to be one of the wonders of the world.
A bill is now before Congress to give
money help for the building of an electric
bicycle railway between this city and New
York. 1t is proposed to run trains at the
rate of 100 miles an hour over a road on
stills. This method of construction is to
be adopted for the purpose of making the
road absolutely level over the entire route,
which will be an air line. Farming oper-
atoms may be conducted beneath, so that
no land will be lost, and casual cows will
be in no danger. Trains ordinarily run on
two rails: but in tins case one rail is to be
underneath and the other overhead. The
cars will have wheels on top as well
beneath. The upper rail Is merely to
steady them when going slowly and for
precaution against accidents
This Is scheme, hguratively, as well
as literally. in the air. but not so the troll
ley that is to connect st. Louis with Chi
cago. The building of the latter road is in
active progress now, and 1t will be in OPP
GRAFTON within two years. Trains will be
run at 100 miles an hour, requiring not
much more than two hours for the whole
distance. The route will be an air line,
with no curves or grades. Valleys will be
bridged over and tunnels will be made
through the hills. The motive power will
tons, which will be located near coal mines
that are owned by the company. A current
of 10000 volts will be employed. The ma
cfinery required is being made in Ger
many. %
Many Inventions.
Each train will be hauled by a motor
car with a nose shaped like a sharp wedge,
so as to encounter as little atmospheric
resistance as possible. This car will also
carry one hundred and fifty passengers.
The other cars for passengers will be like
the coaches in common use with some
slight notifications. The trains will be
short on account of the small amount of
labor required on board of them. Only
two men, the conductor and motorman,
Will be needed 10 run each train. There will
be four tracks two for express and two
for accommodation trains. 1t is under
stood that the total cost of construction
Will be somewhat less than for an ordi-
nary steam railway, the expense of build
ing powerful locomotives and heavy roll
ing stock being taken into consideration.
Along the entire length of this novel
railway from Chicago to st. Louis fine
boulevard will be made running parallel
with the road. Power will be furnished
by the trolley company at any point on
the line to factories and for lighting 1t
may easily be imagined that these facih-
ties, with accommodation trains running
at frequent intervals, will create in the
course of few years an almost contin-
uous string of villages between the two
cities. Power will be supplied to farms
also from the trolley stations, for operat-
ing threshing and other agricultural ma
chnery.
granted in this country for methods of
electrical locomotion. A year ago the city
of New York offered a prize of $4,000 for
the best practical scheme of this descrip-
ton. Two thousand patentees contended
for the reward, but the committee of judges
declared that none of the plans was sat
isfactory, and the prize was withdrawn
by the string which had been attached
to it. Some of the inventions of this kind
recorded at the patent office are quite
extraordinary. A few of them provide
for the suspension of cars from wires, like
the cash trolleys in dry goods shops. An
other system provides for a motor that
runs through trough under ground and
pulls the car along. A motor is exhibited
at the National Museum which has the
armature wound directly upon the axle
connecting the wheels. AS is claimed, it
1t able to attain unlimited speed, save
for the resistance of the atmosphere.
There is another limit, however, which is
set by the tensile strength of the materials
employed in construction That limit be-
ing reached. the engine would fly TO pieces.
The Deadly Wire.
An important disadvantage of the trolley
is that it is apt to get out of order, bring
ing all trains to o standstill. Furthermore,
if a wire breaks and falls to the ground it
will kill anybody who touches it. The ordi-
nary trolley current is 500 volts-a fatal
dose for the strongest man. Before many
years the trolley wires in cities must all
go underground. Towns in Massachusetts
just now are being extensively connected
by troleys, and beginning Is being made
in the same direction along the New Jersey
coast. Already the steam railways in the
bay state are finding the trolleys damaging
competitors. The latter extremely
convenient for such local traffic; they run
as far as the accommodation trains and
with much greater frequency. trolley
road is talked of to connect Baltimore with
this city.
Trains will never be run by storage bat
teries successfully until some way is found
of obtaining electricity more cheaply Unless
water power happens to be available, cleo
tricity ca only be got by burning coal, and
coal will not yield nearly so much energy
in the form of electricity as in the shape
of steam. storage battery capable of
running a car weighs about half ton.
which is so much waste in weight carried.
Furthermore, owing to leakage and other
causes 1t is never possible to get out of
storage battery more than 30 per cent of
per cent more electricity to run car by
storage battery than by a trolley Be
sides, the cars must be kept out of use
half of the time in order to charge the bat
teries, the process requiring twelve hours
or 50; or else the exhausted batteries must
be taken out and replaced with fresh ones,
which is a very laborious business.
Electric locomotives.
The Baltimore and Ohio railway has
nearly completed a tunnel under the city
of Baltimore through which its trains will
be run on the. way between this city and
Philadelphia. Electric locomotives are be-
ing built to haul the trains through the
tunnel in order to do away with smoke.
By the aid of this expensive piece of en-
gineering the railway will cut down its
running time by thirty minutes. To meet
this cut the Pennsylvania railroad is con-
structing steam locomotives of great size
that will pull trains at the rate of eighty
miles an hour. There Is no trouble in get
ting an almost unlimited speed from
steam. 1t is simply question of making
the engines big enough. On the New Jer-
sey Central road today, for a short stretch
of straight and level track near Fanwood,
trains are run at the rate of 112 miles an
hour. But for such rapid running an alb
solute airline is necessary, with no incline.
Enormously heavy bridges. too, are re-
Quired to stand the lar caused by fast