Waterbury evening Democrat., 1907-10-16
"GETTING THERE"

Why do so many accidents happen on American railroads? Bad man.
 agement is the usual answer. But
 those, whether many or few, who
 doubt the correctness of this eXplan-
 ation may find a suggestion in the
 little episode at the Grand Central station yesterday. And perhaps
 even some of those who are quick to
 damn the administration will be it.
 lumined by the behavior of the pas
 sengers on the local trains which
 were prevented from entering the
 station for half an hour yesterday
 forenoon by the derailment of a car
 at the end of the incoming New York
 New Haven and Hartford train.
 There |as neither excitement nor Aanger; everybody supposed the de-
 lay was due to a disarrangement of
 schedule and switches caused by late
 trains. But American nerves could
 not stand the strain of brief sojourn
 in peaceful switchyard. After
 five minutes of waiting women and
 men of high and low degree began
 to pour out of the stalled trains be-
 hind the derailed one, and the be- Seeching advice of the train hands
 to beware of the third rails and the
 yard engines, which were darting about with perilous frequency, fell on deaf ears. Somebody spied a 10 inch plank spanning a deep hole and
 serving as a bridge by which work
 men might pass from the switchyard
 into the Park avenue highway. Then
 somebody said he had to meet Jones in twenty minutes, and away he went over third rails. tracks, chasm and
 bridge A woman having an ap- pointment with her dressmaker fol- lowed gingerly. This was a general signal to all hands. Seventy-year-old- women with bundles trailed their skirts and their steel shafted um- brellas over the deadly third rails children skipped merrily over the danger fraught path, and everybody took huge delight in the excursion. including the scores of spectators in Park avenue, whose suspense and fas- cination suggested that they expected to see somebody stumble and burn to crisp or else be mangled by a pas sing locomotive.
 It is certain that not one person out of every dozen who left the trains had an engagement pressing enougl to warrant the risk involved in clam bering to the street It is certain that the elderly woman who took CT stand between two live third rail and explained to the conductor who was hauling her back to the train that she promised her daughter over in Brooklyn to be there for luncheon on time was suf- fering from the curious mental dis ease epidemic in this region. She like all her fellow passengers. could think of nothing save getting there Hindrances counted for nothing. and justified the means of escaping from the switchyard. Now. if seventy five commuters on one local train take great risks for trifing gain, Is 1t not probable that a similar pro- portion of railroad employees. high and low. are prone to do the same thing? CrOwding on steam, rum ming past danger signals, making work overtime. rum ming too few cars. repairing tracks hastily-may not all these and like misdeeds he prompted by the blind desire to get there'-tO finish on time? But who is to blame? Not only the men doing these things. but the great public that snarls al five minute delays and slow trains These same persons who take their lives ir their hands for no good reason imbue the railroad employees with their own spirit This is not a soft im- peachment. but yesterdays incident makes it as painfully plausible today as it was in the days of the Mississ- ippf steamboat raees-New York Tribune