GENERAL REMARKS.
Rules as to Rights of Track.
The respective rights of trains are frequently spoken of in what has gone before. Any method of dispatching must be subject to modification in some of the details to accord with the particular rules of the road governing train rights. A great deal of ingenuity has been expended in constructing such rules, with a view to avoiding delay to trains under all imagined circumstances. Trains to which the superior right of track has been assigned have been required to wait at meeting-points twenty, thirty or more minutes, and changing or movable rights have been connected with this, and allowances have been made for "variation in watches." These devices may occasionally prove useful, and rules are necessary to govern the trains in the most of their movements, as the telegraph may sometimes be out of order and at best cannot control the general movements of trains as well as it can be done by rule. But where the telegraph is managed with anything like the perfection now possible, the occasions are few upon which it is unavailable for any long time; and whatever may have been the seeming necessity formerly for complicated rules and time allowances, it would seem that these may now be greatly simplified, as has in fact been done in the "Standard" rules.
These rules provide that all trains running in one direction, specified on the time-table, shall have absolute right of track over opposing trains of the same class, the rule being entirely without complication by time allowance for clearance.
This is exceedingly simple and interposes no difficulties in ascertaining the respective rights of these trains. The precaution is observed of requiring superior trains to stop at schedule meeting-points unless the switches are seen to be right and the track clear, and to run cautiously, prepared to stop at other points where a train may be met that has not been met at a schedule meeting-point. This, however, adds no complication to the rule.
For trains of different classes it is simply arranged that those of any class shall clear the main track five minutes before the time of those of a superior class.
It is not within the plan of this work to enter upon a full discussion of the various methods of arranging train rights. It is only insisted that the rules should be simple. This not only tends to safety in their ordinary operation, but greatly simplifies the work of train dispatching and removes the risks to which this work is subjected by a complicated system of train rules. The reduction of the amount of mental effort required of the Dispatcher, in determining what aid he shall give to trains by special orders, reduces the risk of his making mistakes in the preparation of these orders, and the simplicity here urged is in the direct line of the work of the Time Convention committee in the preparation of the "Standard" rules.
Numbering Switches.
Of those matters fixed by the train rules which directly affect the train dispatching, few are more important than the arrangements which determine how trains meeting shall pass each other. It is usually understood and provided that, when trains meet, those having the right of track shall keep the main track, with sometimes an exception to this in favor of trains which cannot go on the siding without backing. Where this latter provision exists it renders it unnecessary for either train to pass the switch in the face of the other when they are to meet at a siding open only at one end. It is sometimes, however, necessary to put a superior train on the siding for a train that is too heavy or too long to go on, or for some other reason. The train order must settle this, but this usually adds to its length. The following provision has been found to entirely meet the case: