A WAR ENTERPRISE

Evening Star, Issue 16911, 7 December 1918, Page 12

A WAR ENTERPRISE

CHANNEL FERRY SERVICE

A recent cable message from London stated :—“Tire cross-Channel train and ferry service was an enormous advantage during tho war in forwarding urgent replacements of guns, tanka, etc., during tho Germans’ March offensive. It is probably not an exaggeration to say that this alone justified the whota outlay. A regular service has boon maintained between Rdchborough (on the coast of Kent, close to Sandwich) and Calais or Dunkirk, and between Southampton and Dieppe, by moans of three twin-screw steamers, 333 feet long, 51 foot bread, 10 feet an draught, with a speed of 12 knotß ? and each provided with four lino of rail track, carrying 54 10-ton waggons. Tho whole scheme was carried out with military labor.” Tho Channel ferry, which was as much talked about boforo the war as tho Channel tunnel, became an accomplished fact during tho war. For soma time jxast low built ferry boats have been running be tween ono of the Channel ports and the French coast with trades taken direct from our railways. On the other side of tho channel the waggons havo been branfered from the ferry boats to the French linos, and so to their destination. Tlio servioo is working under Government control without a hitch, and k proving of tho greatest value. After the war it will be readily adaptable to n service for passengers, who will enter tho tram in London and remain in the carriages until they alight in Paris or Romo. It is 1.3 years since parliamentary powers were first obtained in the country to proceed with a train ferry service between England and France; but, though a syndicate wars formed, with I/orcl Woardalo as chairman and tho late >Sir Wil liam Baker and Sir William Wait© os export advisers, the. war came before tho project materialised. Even at that time there was nothing new in tho idea. In Canada and tho United States alone there are more t!v' i 70 train ferry services over tho great lakes and rivers. On the Continent most travellers used to bo familial- with f’-c service between Germany and Denmark, which, as the late Sir Charles Rivera Wilson once remarked, ‘‘enabled them to sleep as quietly as babes in their railway carriages while travelling acrosS 1 the Continent, and wake np on the other side of tho water without having been disturbed. tho train having been run on hoard ship while they slumbered.’ The chief enginoering difllrulty has always been to get a train on hoard ship when, owing to the tide, there Is a variation of 20ft or more in the water level. This difficulty and others have been most successfully overcome by the Government. From tho French side there has always been the greatest, encouragement for tho Channel ferry, and it is interesting to recall that one of the earliest enthusiasts about tho old scheme was M. Clcmenoeau himself.