RAILWAYS SOLD BY THE YARD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 9611, 8 September 1894, Page 2 (Supplement)

RAILWAYS SOLD BY THE YARD.

HOW A FOUR-MILE LINE GOT LOST; Thep.e are a few great engineering firms in London from whom one may order a portable railway much as one orders a suit of clothes. The novelty of this appealed so much to the writer of this article that he called upon the managing director of one of these companies with the view of acquiring some information, and was further surprised to learn that this gentleman regarded the despatching of a ready-made light railway to tho other end of the world as a very ordinary affair indeed. When the West of India Portuguese Guarantee Railway was being constructed in Goa, Madras, a portable railway seven miles long was ordered by the contractor. There were between 500 ar.d 600 double end-tipping waggons, which cost £7 each. The rails and sleepers weighed but 30 tons to the mile ; and the gross cost of the railway was £2500—-about £360 per mile. No less than £1900, however, was paid for freight and carriage between London and Goa. There was no locomotive ; the trucks were simply pushed by native women, who were paid 4d a day for the work. The line was in use about two years. A three-foot gauge portable railway, four miles long, was ordered lost year by a Peruvian sugar-planter. The raib weighed 65 tons to the mile, and, as is usual in the exporting of portable railways, were packed in fixed sections of convenient length, ready to be laid by unskilled labourers. There were six specially designed sugar-cane trolleys, costing £15 each, and two locomotives at £900, each weighing 9J tons, and capable, under considerable pressure, of travelling at the rate of eight or ten miles an hour. Nevertheless, the little train could carry 100 tons of cane per day, and as there were two harvests a year, it will be seen that it soon justified its purchase. The freight in this case was £1 10s for each waggon, and £'200 for the locomotives. No stoker, signals, or stations are needed on these miniature lines. At Seaford, near Newhaven, there was recently established a railway "250 yards long, which conveyed chalk, lime, and gravel from a high cliff to the beach below, where a sea-wall was in course of construction. It was an 18-inch gauge, and there were twenty or thirty trucks, each carrying yewb at a time. The rails weighed but 101b, and cost about 3s 6d per yard, and the entire line, inclusive of rolling-stock, could be bought up for £150. The smallest steam railway in the world was sent from a London house to a planter in Cuba a few years ago. It was only two miles long, with 121b rails, and 18-inch gauge, and a locomotive Bft in length. The latter weighed 4i tons and cost £400 ; indeed, the entire cost of the railway, including line, 20 trucks, engine, and freight charges, was barely £1200. To complete the absurd picture presented by these tiny " systems" the writer was informed that on one occasion whole railway went astray in transit, just as though it were a picnic hamper. It was a four-mile line, ordered by and completed for a contractor in Copenhagen within five months. The gross weight of the rails was 140 tons (14lb to the yard), and there were no fewer than 250 end and side tipping waggons, which cost altogether £2825. This little railway was to have been used as an aid to the construction of quays on the sea-coast, but, owing to a misunderstanding, it was sent to a port 130 miles from its proper destination. The captain of the steamer carrying it, not feeling inclined to go about Denmark crying, " Whose line is this brought the entire railway back with him. Cotton and sugar-planters in South America frequently let out the little " systems" on their estates for £100 a monththat is, of course, when they themselves are not using the lines. This rental includes rails, waggons, and locomotive, but not the labour involved in removal.