This month we offer a varied selection of items from the British railway press, covering the period from 1873 to 1963.

13 September 1873:details of a remarkable construction on the Central Pacific Railroad, high in the snowy Sierra Nevada, from the Railway Times

22 September 1911: the Railway Gazette reports on Swedish sleeper carriages, and the problems caused by the untidy habits of the sleepers themselves

9 November 1918: the achievement of the builders of the Murmansk Railway across Arctic Russia is saluted by the Railway News

21 October 1921: the Railway Gazette laments the ignorance of railway matters displayed by the daily press

4 April 1924: the illuminated diagram has triumphed in the world of modern railway signalling, announces the Railway Gazette

23 August 1935: some enterprising marketing on the part of Italian State Railways is reported by the Railway Gazette

June 1963: if the new NE Region timetable is to be believed, those controversial diesels are making train services much faster, reports the Railway Magazine

'Central Pacific'
From the Railway Times, 13 September 1873, p. 935

Special appliances have been resorted to to ensure the secure and regular working of the Central Pacific. An important feature in the line in its passage over the Sierra Nevada has been the construction of snow galleries for the protection of the track from the heavy snowstorms incident to that remarkable region. The experiment was first made of covering the track in the cuttings only, reliance being placed upon snow ploughs for clearing the embankments; but experience soon proved that where snow was liable to accumulate to a great depth, its removal even from high embankments would involve great expense, and often delay the movement of trains; and it was, therefore, deemed best to make the covering through the deep snow-belt continuous. More than 30 miles of snow galleries have been built, consuming 52,537,424ft. board measure of sawn timber. These galleries have proved highly successful, and although they have been frequently covered with drifted snow for a depth of 10ft, or 20ft., and in some places on the slope of the Donner mountain for a depth of more than 50ft., they have afforded a safe passage for trains through this inclement region at all times and seasons, and this without any notable detentions. Measures are being adopted for roofing the shedding with galvanised corrugated iron, so as to guard against the chances of fire. Steel rails have been introduced upon the Central Pacific, and they have worn remarkably well. The company's chief engineer recommends their introduction upon the whole of the main line, but this would, of course, involve considerable time. The ties laid between Promontory and Ogden, which were obtained from the Wahsatch and Unitah mountains, have been found to decay rapidly, the quality of the timber met with on those ranges being evidently inferior to that of the Sierra Nevada.

Return to top

'Passenger comfort in Sweden'
From Railway Gazette, 22 September 1911, p. 303

The Swedish State Railways have been running a third-class sleeping car for several months past on a train between Stockholm and Gothenburg. There are three tiers of berths in a section, in each of which two persons can lie. The car is not very well patronised by sleepers, but the unoccupied sections can be used for other passengers. the accommodation is generally satisfactory, so far as the sleeping places are concerned; but there were complaints of a stifling atmosphere, which the railwaymen say was because passengers refused to open ventilators for fear of draughts. A more general complaint was that the early risers found such an accumulation of baggage in the passage that it was almost impossible to move in it.

Return to top

'The Murmansk Railway'
From the Railway News, 9 November 1918, p. 334

An article prepared and published by the Committee on Public Information at Washington gives interesting particulars of this railway in North-East Russia. It runs from Svanka, the main-line junction east of Petrograd, 600 miles north to Kola. Its last 200 miles is within the Arctic Circle, and Kola is the world's only Arctic railroad terminus. When, after nearly two years of war, Russia found the absolute need of having an ice-free port on the Arctic, Goriachkovsky was chosen for the job because he was an engineer who had already solved many problems - his last work had been a railroad along the foot of the Altai mountains. To build the Murmansk in a year and a half - it was finished in November, 1917 - 100,000 men and 15,000 horses were put to work. And in one sense it is an American railroad. For it was built with American materials. Three years before the marines reached the White Sea American ships and freight-handlers were going there with rails and construction machinery. When no pick would open the frozen ground, great fires were built to thaw it for brigades of American steam shovels. When it was found impossible to get supplies through from the south for the construction camps, America was drawn upon for the needed flour and bacon. When a railroad is to be built in record time work must begin simultaneously along almost the whole line. And the tools and rails, the bridge work and supplies must be delivered as near as in anywise possible to the particular section for which they are designed. When the right-of-way was located, it was found that at various points on the road there were adjacent points on the coast of Kola Bay and the White Sea where it might be possible for ships to make a landing. If they could do it, and make their deliveries exactly as per a previously arranged schedule, whole months could be saved. And American ships did it. Despite German submarines waiting for them outside and icebergs impeding traffic within, they made their deliverance as per schedule. Not a day was lost, nor a meal. The bacon and the steel arrived together. If the Murmansk now promises to be one of the most useful roads on earth, America can claim at least part of the credit for its being there.

Return to top

'Railway "news"'
From Railway Gazette, 21 October 1921, p. 590

The extraordinary ignorance of the daily press in regard to railways is, perhaps, never so strikingly illustrated as when it publishes as 'news' information which has no vestige of novelty. A little time ago a leading journal made railwaymen smile by going out of its way to dwell on the electric lighting and hot water appliances on some new rolling-stock as though these commonplaces of travel were a hitherto unheard-of luxury. Recently we had an evening paper giving pride of place in its columns to a 'splash' heading 'New Tubes for London,' the aforesaid 'new tubes' being nothing more than two old schemes - the widening of the City and South London tunnels, and the possibility of an extension of the Hampstead Tube to Edgware, a project which was ancient history before the war. And a few weeks ago one of the leading Sunday papers discussed the technical education of railwaymen in terms that would have had the reader to suppose that scientific railroading was an absolute innovation. In view of the trouble to which the modern press goes in order to ensure accuracy and having regard to the number of experts in various branches on the staff of the average daily, this ignorance in regard to one of the greatest industries in the country is truly remarkable.

Return to top

'A triumph for the illuminated diagram'
From Railway Gazette, 4 April 1924, p. 497

It is now no new thing for a signalman to be unable to see any of his points and signals or the lines or trains he controls and yet to do his work efficiently. As long ago as, in 1906, the opening of the extension of the 'Bakerloo' to the Elephant and Castle, the signalman at Kennington Road - now North Lambeth - did his work under these conditions. This has been made possible by the illuminated diagram, whereon the presence of all trains and vehicles in the area he controls is indicated, also the condition of his signals. Track circuit holds the points when vehicles are on or fouling them, and, moreover, this dispenses with locking- and fouling-bars. The Americans were very quick to adopt this idea, especially as it was not protected by any patent rights, and all the work in the low level yard at Grand Central station, New York, is done by an 'illuminated track indicator,' as they call it. But the crowning achievement in this country is that now to be found at Camden Town on the London Electric Railway, where two double junctions and their signals and a one-and-a-half-minute headway between trains on each line are provided for without the signalman being able to see any of the trains.

Return to top

'Travel propaganda for Italy'
From the Railway Gazette, 23 August 1935, p. 294

Italy makes use of many media to attract tourists from abroad, the most recent of which is the new establishment of the Compagnia Italiana Turismo in Regent Street. Broadcast talks, practical as well as descriptive, are featured from the principal wireless stations, and the Italian State Railways, in collaboration with the State Travel Department, publish a monthly illustrated tourist review entitled Travel in Italy, the current issue of which has recently appeared in even more attractive style than heretofore. Included therewith is a bulletin of tourist news in which the energy and, to an even greater degree, the originality of the State Railway system is exemplified. The benignant eye with which Il Duce regards Young Italy's adventures in romance has already been revealed by the issue of cheap returns to Rome for honeymoon couples. This facility was extended to foreign newlyweds, and the latest concession is that those who avail themselves of it earn the right to repeat the same journey at the same discount of 70 per cent. on the occasion of their Silver or Golden Weddings. We should be wrong to ask such delicacy of invention from the passenger managers of our austere northern latitudes, but in general principle the efforts of Italy to build up a steady tourist trade are worthy of careful study.

Return to top

'Diesels for speed'
From the Railway Magazine, June 1963, p. 373

During 1962 many accelerated services were introduced on British Railways but 1963 bids fair to satisfy the exacting demands of the travelling public in an even larger measure. Of outstanding interest is the North Eastern Region new timetable which becomes operative on June 17. Forty-five weekday trains will maintain an average speed of more than 60 m.p.h. over distances varying between 22 and 293 miles and 12 are scheduled to average more than 70 m.p.h. on the Darlington-York stretch of 44.1 miles, the 'Tees-Tyne Pullman' covering the journey in 35 minutes - a start-to-stop average of 75.6 m.p.h. Of the 45 weekday and 24 Sunday trains between Newcastle and Kings Cross, all are accelerated, one by no less than 68 minutes. On the Leeds-Kings Cross run, 25 weekday and 11 Sunday trains are faster by up to 44 minutes; on the St. Pancras-Leeds-Bradford-Glasgow service, 29 of the trains between Leeds and St. Pancras have been accelerated by up to 46 minutes, with ten trains between Leeds and Glasgow faster by up to 50 minutes. The North Eastern Region is to be congratulated on its comprehensive programme of train accelerations which constitutes a timetabling tour de force. Such timings become possible by making the best use of the inherent advantages of diesel traction and the success of this operation will serve to vindicate this controversial type of motive power.

Return to top

Compiled by Dr Ralph Harrington, Institute of Railway Studies & Transport History, York.