Electricity in Locomotion / An Account of Its Mechanism, Its Achievements, and Its Prospects

by Adam Gowens Whyte

On a deep-level railway, steam is, of course, out of the question. Even on the old 'Underground,' built close to the surface and furnished with frequent openings at the stations, and by means of ventilating shafts, the atmospheric conditions were abominable. The sulphurous fumes were indeed recommended for asthma and other complaints, but on a tube railway they would have been sufficient to cure every human ailment. Therefore the choice lay between electric traction and haulage by cables, compressed air, or some other innocuous system. Within these limits electricity was chosen on its merits.

The first railway in Great Britain to undertake conversion was one in which both the physical and economic troubles were exceptionally serious. The Mersey Railway is little more than a tunnel under the river, and it is distinguished by heavy gradients and by the continuous necessity of pumping out the water which drains into it. With steam traction the difficulty of ventilating the tunnel was an added trouble. Owing to these various causes the working expenses were abnormally heavy, and led ultimately to a receivership. Electric traction was adopted as the only possible cure. The pumping and ventilation arrangements were both reorganised for electric power; and the trains were equipped with electric traction on the 'multiple-unit' system, an arrangement—to be described in the next chapter—which is well suited to the economical handling of steep gradients. The practical result was a great increase in traffic, with a marked decrease in the proportion of expenses to receipts.

No other British railways, happily, were in so desperate a condition as the Mersey line, but all of them were, at the end of last century, feeling the effect of certain disquieting tendencies. These tendencies were most marked in connection with suburban and short-distance inter-urban traffic, which is quite distinct in character from the main-line traffic. We talk glibly enough of railway traffic as if it were a unity, but it is clear that very different considerations govern the traffic on a main line between, say, London and Glasgow, and those which control the traffic on London suburban routes or on a railway connecting the adjacent towns of the Potteries. Some railways have to deal with all three classes at the same time and occasionally on the same lines of rails. Electric traction has, so far, made itself felt only where the suburban or similar inter-urban traffic has been separable from the main line traffic.

The growth which took place in suburban traffic before and after the end of the century ought to have brought increased prosperity to the railway companies, but it did not always do so. Competition between the various companies led to a reduction in fares; Parliament, by establishing workmen's fares, forced the companies to carry an ever-increasing number of passengers at a loss, or at least without profit; wages tended to increase and hours of working to decrease—both affecting the cost of operation; rates and taxes became heavier and heavier with the growth of municipal expenditure; and a higher standard of comfort and efficiency was demanded by the public. In some instances the situation was aggravated by the competition of electric tramways along routes parallel to the railways. This competition was limited to point-to-point traffic, its maximum range being about three miles; but it was a grievance against which the railway companies protested very loudly, especially when the tramways were owned by local authorities to which the railways paid large sums in rates.

The general effect of all these factors was to reduce the margin of profit on which the railways were working. We have seen, in the case of tramways, how easy it is for a slight change in a frequently-recurring expense to have a serious effect in the aggregate. Railways are in much the same position; and the various influences at work upon the suburban traffic brought them face to face with the importance, if not the necessity, of finding some means of dealing with larger volumes of traffic on a basis more economical than that provided by steam locomotives.

This means they found in electric traction; but it may be noted that even railway engineers took some time to realise exactly what electric traction offered them. They were looking for something to reduce their annual expenses; and when they made calculations about electric traction they found that, when the expense of providing the electrical equipment was taken into account, the total cost of hauling the trains electrically on the existing schedule might be greater instead of less than the cost of steam haulage. They were therefore inclined to look upon the economic benefits of electric traction as an illusion.

In course of time, however, it came to be recognised that the function of electricity is not to act like a blue pencil on the debit side of the revenue account. Its essential purpose is to increase the volume of traffic. From the public point of view this is very much more valuable. Passengers are not directly concerned with means of reducing working expenses, but they are closely interested in the improvement of the frequency and speed of the service. The adoption of electricity on suburban lines has really been dictated by the demand for increased facilities. At the 'rush' hours of the morning and evening, when the great tide of workers flows and ebbs, the capacity of the steam lines was taxed to the utmost. And with the growth of population the difficulty of running sufficiently frequent trains became almost insuperable.

Apart from these particular necessities, the general features of railway economics point to the supreme advantage of increasing the volume of traffic in every possible way. In a railway, as in a tramway, the preponderating item is the cost of construction and maintenance; and unless a certain minimum of traffic is carried, the most economical working in the world will not secure a profit. The standing charges fall upon the idle hours as well as upon the busy; for every minute that a line of rails stands empty there is a loss of money. Railway progress depends upon reducing the proportion of idle hours; and that can only be done where there is scope for the growth of traffic, and where there is means—such as electric traction—of dealing with that growth on an economical basis.

In the succeeding chapter it is explained how electric traction enables a more frequent service to be run with advantage even on systems which were worked to the maximum limit possible under steam conditions. But in the meantime it will be interesting to trace the effect itself on a railway which soon followed the Mersey Railway in making the change from steam to electricity—the Metropolitan District Railway.