Text 2. The railways in the future

Railways everywhere are engaged in a war - a grim eco­nomic war - and in no field is it fiercer than in the battle for passengers. The railways are fighting today in the same way as the stage-coaches and canals did in the last century.

When the car owner wants to travel he considers only the cost of his petrol because the other sums have to be paid whether he uses his car or not. Naturally, he believes his car is much cheaper than any form of public transport, especially, if he has his family with him, and much more convenient because it will take him and his luggage from door to door.

Where distances are long, the speed of air travel is such that people choose to fly and not to undertake a long, com­paratively slow travel by rail. So the railway is beset on all sides - by the car for short journey and the aircraft for long.

Fortunately for railways there is a middle distance and it is in this middle zone that the railways have the chances to win the traffic.

What is to be the role of railways in the future? Will it succeed in remaining one of the world's principal means. These locomotives were simple in design and strongly built, with minimum of equipment which could give trouble. In short, they represented electric motors on wheels. It was these factors that were the main reason of their long life. The brakes installed were operated by compressed air.

The device called the "dead man's handle" used later was not known at that time, so a second man, called a "loco boy", was carried on the engine to take control of the train if "the driver became ill or lost control of the train.

All the current supplied to the Underground was gener­ated at a specially built power plant. The current was taken along the tunnel by feeder cable.

The first electric underground railway was a great success and attracted so many, passengers that it was decided, to increase the fare during the peak hours; but this unusual, measure was unnecessary for after the signalling was improved a more frequent service of trains was provided of transport? If so, what is it to be like and what traffic is it to carry?

The railway is likely to remain as a vital means of communication for many years yet. For this, however, the railway will have to increase its speed. Recent investiga­tions have shown that steel wheels on steel rails are capable of achieving much more in this field than it was thought before. Only a few decades ago 125 mph were considered as the upper limit of speed on conventional track, but V15CM60 mph have already proved possible in regular service if the track is carefully laid and well maintained.

The need for speed is recognized, so is the need for comfort. Ordinary comforts of seating, food, air-condition­ing, etc., can be taken for granted, but there will have to be a considerable rebuilding of main lines to reach the proper standards and easing of curves on high-speed lines to protect passengers from the effects of centrifugal force.

As train speeds increase so does the power needed to operate them;- That, is why qareful attention will have to be devoted to the aerodynamic shape of the front end of trains and to light but strong construction of the rolling stock.

TEXT 3. THE PROBLEM OF HIGH-SPEED FREIGHT TRAFFlC

The problem of high speeds involves a great number of other problems to be solved whether engineering or eco­nomic.

High speeds are possible but expensive. Today, signall­ing, brakes and track - because the wear on the rails in­creases rapidly with higher speeds - are all being improved at the same time as the motive power; and this costs money. To be economical, the new expensive tracks suitable for high speeds will have to be intensively used.

Fast passenger and slow freight trains, however, cannot be mixed on the same track. The alternative is to have one route for passenger trains and another for freight. But maintaining two routes instead of one also costs too much money. Perhaps the real solution is to bring freight trains up to passenger standards. The closer the speed of freight trains approaches that of passenger trains, the better. And the faster the speed of all types of trains, the more jour­neys each train can make. In this way few trains can do more work and this results in the reduction of capital costs.

In this connection, it is of interest to note that when the new Tokaido Line in Japan was built it was decided that it should be used both for freight and passenger trains;' Goods were to be loaded in containers and carried on-specially-built multiple-unit trains designed to carry con­tainers and including most of the features of the passenger stock.

In fact, the super-fast freight trains have never been built. But there is little doubt that this is the direction-in which things are to move in the future. When high ­speed passenger and freight trains use the same track, the same signalling, and so on, they will be able to reach the point where the equipment will be employed to optimum efficiency.