THE MONORAIL.

♦— OVER A HUNDRED MILES AN HOUR. THE MANCHESTER AND LIVERPOOL ELECTRIC EXPRESS RAILWAY, ♦'Why Monorail?" That (writes Wayland Smith in the "Pall Mall Magazine 1 ') is what everybody asks when conversation turns upon the subject o_ the wonlerful cc-w express electric railway, which is to carry passengers between Manchester and Liverpool at a speed of anything between 110 and 120 miles an hour. The Bill for enabling this very odd sort of raiiVay to be made has been before Parliament these two sessions. The soheme secured the assent of ai committee of the House of Lords before Whitsuntide ; and by the time these lines see the light, it may either have passed the Commons Committee, or haTe been sent back for another year. (The Bill passed through Parliament on August 9.) So deliberately are these things done in this crowded old land of ours, where every square foot of soil bristles with vested interests, and every proposal to perform some old public service in a new aaid better way ig certaiin of the stout opposition of those who . for various reasons would vastly prefer that things should remain as they are. You cannot make a railway of any kind without buying the land necessary for the 'line and the stations ; and you cannot buy the lamd ypu want unless you have a special Act of Parliament compelling owners *to 6ell it upon reasonable terms. Parliament is very discriminating in granting these powers for the compulsory purchase of land ; and never bestows them except for ample cause shown, aaid under the conviction that the sacrifice of private right is expedient in the greater interests of the public. It costs something to force this conviction home to the thoroughly disinterested minds of the Members of Parliament who serve upon Private Bill Committees, and constitute, at considerable pains to themselves, the best tribunal of common-sense the -corld can show. And when the scheme submitted to Parliament is of so very novel a character as' that of the Monorail Electric -Express Railway, the mfere fact that' it has received the approbation of a committee .of either House is to be received as strong presumptive proof thajt there is something in it. How much, of course," cannot be exactly stated; because the passing of a Railway Act merely clears the way dor experiment. PASSENGERS ONLY. Here it will be a, gain to the cause of clear explanation, if the several elements that enter into the combination which supplies the title of this article are taken separately, in their order. The proposal to make a new railway between) Manchester and Liverpool is natural enough. The first complete railway of the modern type connected these great centres of population, commerce, and industry; and the precedent can ■ be cited as sufficient inducement for the location here of the pioneer line of a new . transportation system.. Notwithstanding th e existence off railway facilities that have cost £6,000,000 sterling to provide, there are people who think there is room for another link between the -populations -on ; tho Mersey and the Irwell ; and they are ready to back their fancy. The new line will differ very materially from the ordinary railways —a circumstance which- is far from disarming the enmity of the old railway interest. It will carry passengers, only, in cars running singly, at short intervals all day long, and tlie usual speed -will be, as already stated, 110 to 120 miles an hour — which is jiuft half the best- time of the firstclass railways. There will be no intermediate stations. That is, to all intents and purposes, the only consideration which directly concerns the public, who are expected to justify by their patronage the I venture of the promoters. If there is sufficient attractiveness in the offer of through transport between Manohester and Liverpool in the brief space of eighteen or twenty minutes, with no waiting at the terminal stations, then it is only a question of the number of people who will want to use the line, as to whether it will^pay or not." There is no doubt as to the possibility of the thing being done as stated. THE MOTIVE POWER, The motive power of the railway will be electric ; because there is no known alternative means of getting the required speed. The limit of rate of travel of a steam locomotive over rails — one or many is immaterial — ihas long ago been reached. So far as technical knowledge of the working conditions at present extends, there is no reason why electric railways should not bs worked at a regular . speed of a hundred and twenty or a hundred and fifty miles an hour: Indeed, the latter speed is talked of for a passenger line between Viemna ar.d Buda-Pe<?th ; as weli as between Berlin 'and Zosseoi, and from Brussels to Antwerp. THE IDLE TRACK. Ths characteristic feature of ck-otric locomotion differentiates it so completely from steam locomotion*, that the divergence gees right through the whole system', from roll-ing-stock to ticket taking, miuking of <the electric line a new creature. To begin with the permanent way: obviously, when no trains are running, the line is earning nothing. All the capital is lying idle, in lamd, and bridges, ar.d twni-fls, and rail-metal ; the signalmen are waiting at their posts ; the directors in their parlours, the porter at the gate ; and a-il amd everything is there waiting on the trains, while the people outside wait for them. Has ifc .never occurred to you, reader, while Avasting your precicu*. time at a roadside station*, that if trains Avero run* on the "little amd often" rule, instead of the. traffic be'rng fed rather after the boa constiriictor model*- — " once a month a-nd nothing between '" — it Avould bs a bless.;':! reformation? I-t is t'jsy to rb--w why heavy 'trains, if few, must- be the rule of traffic'-msnageantni- fcr a. railway Avorksd by Mteam locomotives. The loxcvs must be accumulated for the engines, Avhich canaiot go running about with single trucks or coaches. The locomotive engine has the defects of its qua/rit*i*e*s, one of which is that it can only operate where it is. If you wan* iit to Avnrk at its best, 'hitch it on to ten or moTe coaches; if at its worst, for itself and owners, increase the number of locomotivas and give tbsm a cn*:iol. apiece. THE ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVE. An eleotric line, fin tho contrary, has its motive power constantly laid on everywhere, to the utt-crm/ost extremities. All that is wanted is -a moans of helpling r,-ne or any number of coxches on the line to the po*wer lying in rea-dunoss in an adjacent condtuctoT; and off fhe starts. There is no r-'dce-sity for waiting. 'i.lie electric lccomot.w is a c^>m'pa.r.Tti\-cly s nu;sll affair, Avhich may eit-heir lie perdu in tho ea-n ia.g'c' it-self — as in -strpet. tra.nic-.irs-— or ba carried separately. a.s Ln the. "twopenny tube" lines. Avbe never it may be it requires to mnke contact with -the live conductor, AA-hich i_, charged Avith powfr -anywhere by means of a oenitmi generating station ; a.nd it simply responds to the distant d-yroaimo. There being n:> rapid 'to-an-d-fro amo-tiion, as in stawi mirrors, there is no osciilatiien to import aia unnecessary obstacle to tho genie- 1

j ration of high travelling speeds. So far as tho motive power as concerned, there fore, onra may go -as fast and as often a.s one like?, on an electric railway. Imagine* wha* a comifbrt it would be, if 'this facility prevailed over all railways, so that the a/nnoyanco of losing trains, the vexation of waiting for them, amd the martyrdom of catching them, were all dome awwy with -together ! MONORAIL—WHY NOT? Bufc whiait of the' line? Well, after all •this preliminary discussion of the other elements of the proposed solution of the problem of rapid inter-urban passenger transportation din the Lancashire district, we can hop© to findi an initelligible r-J'ply to the question, " Why tMonorail?" To which the originator of this kim'd of railway, Mr F. B. Behir, -w»uk_ uinth-esita'fcinig'ly .answer.- in. the dasconoeitia-g manner of ithe immortal " Alioe " company — " Why not?" If a single rail is as good as two, why spend money on the superfluity? What can two, or twenty rail- do more than one, assuming that the carrying ' of a -travelling vehicle through th* int-eaanedliary of 'wjhieels its all that ds required? Really, ira face of so simple a " poser," it i-s extremely difficult to think of amy. coovirocing obje^tilcm. Further pondering only gives rise to the suspicion that there is too such objecti-o-m. Boiled down, oine's first stai-ibled amtagonismi to the idea oi the single rail is .foumdi to have ok> other base than the -urausuaih-e-s of the project. Trains always ihave beaoi tu-i. tiponi two liqes of rails ; and it seems to belong to the very nature of things thiat thiey should cmnfc'nue to co run to the enid of time. But the eragimieer, who has fully infoc'iiitec. from his maitM -uncle, the sapper, the propansiiity to set all conventional notions at naught, blandly asks if we are quito sure that railway .trains do run. oni two rai-9. Tbey rest on •_ pair of rails, it is .true ; but the engineer suggests that all four- wheeled eau-riages owej their stability at high speeds to the generally unsuspected fact that they then tuh upon what is essentially >a sipgle ta&ck— the width of their wheel-base, yfai the case of itih'- ordamaxy (railway, the tra.ck is five feet wide. The circumstance of the middle poi-iotn being cut away is immaterial. It is made one track by the rigidity of the ajcte of the vehicle. At anythang like a high rate of speed, the railway carriage beooanes'* virtually ai bicycle — that. is. to* gay, it runs on on. -linear path, a-nd is as saie from overturning as a well-driven hoop. If aaiybody wiisl-os to' ksnow what happens when a carriage ireally rums upon more than a single linear track, let hian try rounding a corner sharply, or inegotiaitircg a round road on a tricycle. If still unsatisfied, let him replace the rigid axles of a four-wheeled vehicle witih ropes, amd go foa? a sharp drive — tbe dootor following roa cab. THE BALANCE. The monorail, therefore, is simply __ railroad track reduced to' its simplest expression. Catrs can. run upon it sacurely by virtue of the adtoptdoi-of the principle of the old rope-wal'k__g toy of our . irtfamcy — the tin Blonidttn wirtS. this curved balancing pole, which brought the cembre of gravity, bemeaith the point of strspensioiri. The House oi Xcirds Coanmibtee made this principle of balancing a sine qua non of ithe Bill. Fot the rest, the Behr monorail is a sta-ut on-abal, borne at -the'spex of trainverse A stao-dards, upon whioh the cairiage wheels sit. On each site the abandar-cfc) run supplementary guide nails, whose oflfoe^is' to dn^ag© ._brr&spon*B--iajg rollers on the carriage frame, whioh keep the : vehicle 1 upright-, and prevent it from swayjng impleasaint-y when, going round curves.' B.ut for these curves, -there ciced not be any guide rollers. The . staind'ands aa. bolted down to sleepers! of the ordinary pattern, so that the psrroaa-Stnt way is one long, low metallic viaduct. It is impossible to dieny the quality of comparative cheapness to such: (a construction, having regard to the enormous solidity e-ss©nta*a.l for afl. express railway of the ordinary description. SIGNALLING AND STOPPING. A good deal ha-s been said about the agnalMiig and stoppemg arrangements for such a line as that in contemplation. So far as any question) of the successful working of monorail lines goes, ample experience exists to prove that they give less trouble than ordinary railways. The Bailybunion and Listowel Light Railway is the proof. Doubts have been reasonably expressed, however, as to what might happen at a speed of a hundred and twenty miles an hour. The subject is not an easy one ; but, after all, the gap between what has bsen accomplished in this way and that which remains to be done is not so tremendous that ono need despair of the competence of modem science and invention to span it. An interesting detail is the proposed method of signalling. As there are no intermediate stations, no junctions, ar.d no mixed traffic on ths express railway, stops by signal are not to be expected 1 as ordinary incidents of a run. The signal stations ara spaced seven miles apart. Eveiy car as it passes one of these stations automatically blocks the last two sections over which it- has passed. Thus there cannot be a less distance than fourteen miles botween car and car. In the event of a car running past an adverse signal, three things immediately happen : a bell rings violently in the car; the motor is automatically cut* off from the conductor, thus stopping the supply of driving energy ; and an electric brake is applied. At the same moment the signalman's own bell is rung, and he can telephone all through the system the intelligence that tliere is ai stoppage. These stopping evolutions db no. depend upon the volition of tho guard of the car. A travelling electric battery does all the work. The most liberal estimates of the time to be occupied in bringing the car to rest from a speed of a hundred and twenty miles an hour allow that tbis can be very comfortably done within a distance of three-and-a-half miles. Hence there can be no " overtaking collisions," humanly speaking, on this line. lf this pioneer lino is made .and succeeds, others will be made in many places : London, say, brought within half an hour of Brighton, and Portsmouth only ten niinutes. farther off. What a delightful prospect !