THE IRON ROAD

Evening Star, Issue 19760, 10 January 1928, Page 5

THE IRON ROAD

TRIALS AND ADVENTURES DF RAILWAY PIONEERS It is perhaps difficult nowadays for travellers, rushing through die greeu English couutryside and probably lulled into a comfortable lethargy by good food and the rhythmic song of the railway carriage, to realise the problems which beset the pioneers of railway construction (says ‘ John o’ London’s Weekly’). We are in danger of accepting the iron road without a thought of those who made it, and it is well that we should be reminded of the problems which were solved and the battles which were fought before railways destroyed the prejudices of earlier days and won over the imaginations of the public. ‘ The History of the Great Western Railway,’ by E. T. MacDemot, published in two parts by the Great Western Railway Company, is a complete and authoritative history of the rise of that system, which alone of the great railway companies retained the privilege of using its own name in the amalgamation which followed upon the passing of the Railway Act in 1921. ETON OBJECTS. Sumo measure of tho early opposition to tile suggested railway between Bristol and London can bo gained from tho fact that tho provost of Eton College said that “ no public good whatever could possibly come from such an undertaking, and he should be wanting in his duty to tho establishment over which ho presided if he did not oppose it to the utmost of his ability.”- Eton College wished to preserve its splendid isolation, and the inhabitants of Windsor objected on the grounds that the railway did not come close enough to their town! Eton was singularly determined in opposition. The lawyers even suggested that the morals and discipline of the school would be ruined by the proximity of the railway; but the advantages to be gained were eloquently demonstrated by the fact that a special train was commissioned to convey scholars from Eton to London m the midst of Hie litigation. AN ATTACK OF NERVES. Of course, the idea of a tunnel appalled the imagination of the timorous, and a witness, an engineer, said that the consequences of constructing a projected tunnel with an incline of one in a hundred would be wholesale slaughter of human life; another that “no person would desire to bo shut out from tho daylight with a consciousness that be had a superincumbent weight of earth sufficient to crush him in case of accident”; and a third that “ the noise of two trains passing in the tunnel would shako the nerves of this assembly. Ido not know such a noise. No passenger would be induced to go twice!” However, notwithstanding the force of tho opposition, the Royal assent was given to the Bill on August 31. 1835.

The outstanding feature of the story of tlio Great Western Railway is, of course, the battle it waged, with various degrees of intensity, and for a number of years, over the question of the gauge—that is, the width between iho two railway lines. This battle of the gauge lasted tea years.

THE GAUGE WAR. The width between the railway fin® is 4ft Bjin. Curious people might aidi? why, and the answer would be M jusSq; accident.” Actually the gauge of tlia . British railways was determined by the simple fact that the width of the olcjgvj wooden tramways of the land collieries was fixed on Hie di&l*} tance between the wheels of the carts'] ot the district. When wooden Irani?J ways gave place to iron rails thesarS were laid on the existing timbers. Bus Isambard Kingdom Brunei, thjO lamias engineer on the Groat WeSlrS] cm Railway, gave considerable thouglnrd :o the question, and, in. fact, detcrSj| mined that a 7ft gauge would be to|l the advantage ot both passengers andfj directors, and lie advocated his caused] with such persistent eloquence aaoi vigor tiiat the gauge of 7ft was sane- ] tionod on October 29, 1835. During this battle, says Mr Mac-, * Dermot, “ the broad gauge waa: istabbed in the back, and its ultimata' defeat hastened hy the mutiny of the ; Oxford, Worcester, and Wolverhampton Railway.” “Tin's rebellious daughter,” in spite of laws, contracts, and agreements, went over to Hie enemy, and though it had laid down broadgauge rails in accordance with agreements. it laid down narrow with them, and used the latter. RUN ON THE LINE.

When the Great Western Railway was first opened in 1838, and for somo tune afterwards, there was no careful regulation of traffic, and the most exfraoidmarily (as it appears to us todpy) erratic working was pennitted. .trains, says Mr Mae Dermot, were not even always confined to tlie proper up •-'id down loan. One of the thorns in the flesh of tho practical engineers of this lime wr.s Dr Dionysius Lard nee. "'ho seemed to have elected himself as the official representative of tho British public, it was lie who opposed tlie practical engineers with all manner of arguments, which he thought would refute their claims, and it was lie who, in September and October of IS3B, drove an experimental train up and down die line, bore, there, and everywhere, in the midst of the ordinary traffic. It is recorded that on September t'O ‘‘ the 8 o’clock train ran into the expel imental train this morning and inpited three of tho carriages very nincb.’’

Ail tin'.-: took place in the eagerness of the early months, hut within a year such da.’igctous practices wore avoided, and the authorities were soon warned of the dang.is of allowing eager but innocent experimentalists tho freedom of the lino. ,