The history of railways

The railway is а good example of а system evolved in variousplaces to fulfil а need and then developed empirically. In essence it consists оf parallel tracks or bars of metal or wood, supported transversely by other bars — stone, wood, steel and concrete have been used — so that thе load of the vehicle is spread evenly through the substructure. Such tracks were used in the Middle Ages for mining tramways in Europe; railways came to
England in the 16th century and went back to Europe in the 19th century as an English invention.

English railways

The first Act of Parliament for а railway, giving right of way over other people's property, was passed in 1758, and the first for а public railway, to carry the traffic of all comers, dates from 1801. The Stockton and Dailington Railway, opened on 27
September 1825, was the first public steam railway in the world, although it had only one locomotive and relied on horse traction for the most part, with stationary steam engines for working inclined planes.

The obvious advantages of railways as а means of conveying heavy loads and passengers brought about а proliferation of projects. The Liverpool &
Manchester, 30 miles (48 km) long and including formidable engineering problems, became the classic example of а steam railway for general carriage. It opened on 15 September 1830 in the presence of the Duke of
Wellington, who had been Prime Minister until earlier in the year. On opening day, the train stopped for water and the passengers alighted on to the opposite track; another locomotive came along and William Huskisson, an
МР and а great advocate of the railway, was killed. Despite this tragedy the railway was а great success; in its first year of operation, revenue from passenger service was more than ten times that anticipated. Over 2500 miles of railway had been authorized in Britain and nearly 1500 completed by 1840.

Britain presented the world with а complete system for the construction and operation of railways. Solutions were found to civil engineering problems, motive power designs and the details of rolling stock. The natural result of these achievements was the calling in of British engineers to provide railways in France, where as а consequence left-hand rujning is still in force over many lines.

Track gauges

While the majority of railways in Britain adopted the 4 ft 8.5 inch
(1.43 m) gauge of the Stockton &
Darlington Railway, the Great Western, on the advice of its brilliant but eccentric engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, had been laid to а seven foot
(2.13 m) gauge, as were many of its associates. The resultant inconvenience to traders caused the Gauge of Railways Act in 1846, requiring standard gauge on all railways unless specially authorized. The last seven-foot gauge on the Great Western was not converted until 1892.

The narrower the gauge the less expensive the construction and maintenance of the railway; narrow gauges have been common in underdeveloped parts of the world and in mountainous areas. In 1863 steam traction was applied to the 1 ft 11.5 inch (0.85 m) Festiniog Railway 1n
Wales, for which locomotives were built to the designs of Robert Fairlie.
Не then led а campaign for the construction of narrow gauges. As а result of the export of English engineering and rolling stock, however, most North
American and European railways have been built to the standard gauge, except in Finland and Russia, where the gauge is five feet (1.5 m).

Transcontinental lines

The first public railway was opened in America in 1830, after which rapid development tookplace. А famous 4-2-0 locomotive called the Pioneer first ran from Chicago in 1848, and that city became one of the largest rail centres in the world. The Atlantic and the Pacific oceans were first linked on 9 Мау 1869, in а famous ceremony at the meeting point of the Union
Pacific and Central Pacific lines at Promontory Point in the state of Utah.
Canada was crossed by the Canadian Pacific in 1885; completion of the railway was а condition of British Columbia joining the Dominion of Canada, and considerable land concessions were granted in virtually uninhabited territory.

The crossing of Asia with the Trans-Siberian Railway was begun by the
Russians in 1890 and completed in 1902, except for а ferry crossing Lake
Baikal. The difficult passage round the south end of the lake, with many tunnels, was completed in 1905. Today more than half the route is electrified. In 1863 the Orient Express ran from Paris for the first time and eventually passengers were conveyed all the way to Istanbul
(Constantinople).

Rolling stock

In the early days, coaches were constructed entirely of wood, including the frames. Ву 1900, steel frames were commonplace; then coaches were constructed entirely of steel and became very heavy. One American 85-foot
(26 m) coach with two six-wheel bogies weighed more than 80 tons. New lightweight steel alloys and aluminium began to be used; in the 1950s the Budd company in America was building an 85-foot coach which weighed only 27 tons. The savings began with the bogies, which were built without conventional springs, bolsters and so on; with only two air springs on each four-wheel bogie, the new design reduced the weight from 8 to 2,5 tons without loss оf strength or stability.

In the I880s, 'skyscraper' cars were two-storey wooden vans with windows used as travelling dormitories for railway workers in the USA; they had to be sawn down when the railways began to build tunnels through the mountains. After World War II double-decker cars of а mоrе compact design were built, this time with plastic domes, so that passengers could enjoy the spectacular scenery on the western lines, which pass through the Rocky
Mountains.

Lighting on coaches was by means of oil lamps at first; then gas lights were used, and each coach carried а cylinder оf gas, which was dangerous in the event of accident or derailment. Finally dynamos on each car, driven by the axle, provided electricity, storage batteries being used for when the car was standing. Heating on coaches was provided in the early days by metal containers filled with hot water; then steam was piped from the locomotive, an extra drain on the engine's power; nowadays heat as well as light is provided electrically.

Sleeping accommodations were first made on the Cumberland Valley
Railroad in the United States in 1837. George Pullman's first cars ran on the Chicago & Alton Railroad in 1859 and the Pullman Palace Car Company was formed in 1867. The first Pullman cars operated in Britain in 1874, а year after the introduction of sleeping cars by two British railways. In Europe in 1876 the International Sleeping Car Company was formed, but in the meantime George Nagelmackers of Liege and an American, Col William D'Alton
Маnn, began operation between Paris and Viennain 1873.

Goods vans [freight cars] have developed according to the needs of the various countries. On the North American continent, goods trains as long as
1,25 miles are run as far as 1000 miles unbroken, hauling bulk such as raw materials and foodstuffs. Freight cars weighing 70 to 80 tons have two four wheel bogies. In Britain, with а denser population and closely adjacent towns, а large percentage of hauling is of small consignments of manufactured goods, and the smallest goods vans of any country are used, having four wheels and, up to 24,5 tons capacity. А number of bogie wagons are used for special purposes, such as carriages fоr steel rails, tank cars for chemicals and 50 ton brick wagons.

The earliest coupling system was links and buffers, which allowed jerky stopping and starting. Rounded buffers brought snugly together by adjustment of screw links with springs were an improvement. The buckeye automatic coupling, long standard in North America, is now used in Britain.
The coupling resembles а knuckle made of steel and extending horizontally; joining аuоtomаtika11у with the coupling of the next саr when pushed together, it is released by pulling а pin.

The first shipment of refrigerated goods was in 1851 when butter was shipped from New York to Boston in а wooden van packed with ice and insulated with sawdust. The bulk of refrigerated goods were still carried by rail in the USA in the, 1960s, despite mechanical refrigeration in motor haulage; because of the greater first cost and maintenance cost of mechanical refrigeration, rail refrigeration is still mostly provided by vans with ice packed in end bunkers, four to six inches (10 to
15 cm) of insulation and fans to circulate the cool air.

Railways in wartime

The first war in which railwaysfigured prominently was the American Civil War (1860-65), in which the Union
(North) was better able to organize andmake use of its railways than the
Confederacy (South). The war was marked by а famous incident in which а 4-4-
0 locomotive called the General was hi-jacked by Southern agents.

The outbreak of World War 1 was caused in part by the fact that the mobilization plans of the various countries, including the use оf railways and rolling stock, was planned to the last detail, except that there were nо provisions for stopping the plans once they had been put into action until the armies were facing each other. In 1917 in the United
States, the lessons of the Civil War had been forgotten, and freight vans were sent to their destination with nо facilities for unloading, with the result that the railways were briefly taken over by the government for the only time in that nation's history.

In World War 2, by contrast, the American railways performed magnificently, moving 2,5 times the level of freight in 1944 as in 1938, with minimal increase in equipment, and supplying more than 300,000 employees to the armed forces in various capacities. In combat areas, and in later conflicts such as the Korean war, it proved difficult to disrupt an enemy's rail system effectively; pinpoint bombing was difficult, saturation bombing was expensive and in any case railways were quickly and easily repaired.

State railways

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