Tube, Train, Tram, and Car; or, Up-to-date locomotion

TUBE, TRAIN, TRAM, AND CAR OR UP-TO-DATE LOCOMOTION

BY ARTHUR H. BEAVAN AUTHOR OF “MARLBOROUGH HOUSE AND ITS OCCUPANTS,” “IMPERIAL LONDON,” “CROWNING THE KING,” ETC. WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS And an Introduction BY LLEWELLYN PREECE, M.I.E.E.

THE object of this work is to present the subject of Electrical Locomotion to the public for the first time, the author believes, in a popular form, giving interesting information about Tube, Train, Tram, and Motor-car, but avoiding, as much as possible, technical and scientific detail.
Electrical traction is of national importance, destined perhaps materially to abate the evil of overcrowding, by providing cheap and rapid means of access from centres of industry to country districts and vice versa .
It was predicted by George Stephenson in 1825 that his system would supersede all other methods of conveyance in this country. Similarly can it now be prophesied that throughout the world electrical traction will ultimately supplant all other forms. An age of electricity is dawning, when “power” may be obtained direct from fuel or from the vast store of energy existing in the heated interior of the earth, or even from the atmosphere that surrounds us; when every mountain stream and gleaming waterfall throughout Great Britain, and each tide as it rises and falls, will help to generate the subtle fluid, which, produced on a vast scale abroad, where giant cataracts and mighty rapids abound, may be imported to supplement our home supply, and be utilised in every manufacturing district; when all our main lines will be electric, and “light railways” ubiquitous; when coal-less ships and aerial machines, with perfected accumulators, may possibly traverse sea and ocean, and invade the domain of condor and eagle; when farms will be cultivated by electrical contrivances, and their produce expeditiously conveyed to market, and the sanitation of our streets be ensured by the universal use of horseless vehicles. An age that may witness “current” laid on for domestic purposes to every house in the land as a matter of course; and also as machine-power to village settlements, where artisans engaged in certain kinds of trade may work amidst the pleasant surroundings of home. And thus the abstract principle, “Back to the land,” may become an accomplished fact.