The use of the opposite tracks for laying off trains is frequently practiced, but usually under the protection of signals only. Where there are two, three or four tracks a much more extended use of them might be made for passing trains around each other, by the adoption of the methods for single track train dispatching, with good results in the saving of sidings and in keeping heavy trains moving, and it is not improbable that expenditure for additional tracks might sometimes be postponed for considerable periods by the proper adaptation of the telegraph. There would seem to be here an opportunity for managers to keep down their capital account by increasing the capacity of their tracks by the addition of a wire. That this has not been done in many cases may have been owing to the slow advance of the science of train dispatching in past years, or perhaps to limited information on the part of railroad owners and officers as to its capabilities. It is certainly true that single track roads with siding facilities none too good are now doing an amount of business that not many years ago would have been thought to imperatively demand additional tracks.
CONCLUSION.
Telegraphic train dispatching came with the telegraph. The first attempts were very crude. As late as the year 1865, on one of our most important railroads, the plan was for any conductor to telegraph from a station where he might be, to the conductor of an opposing train at the next station, stating when he would leave, and where he would meet the other. When the two came to an understanding they went ahead.
The early orders, in the attempt to render them more secure, were often obscured by accumulated cautions as to how to run, and by general directions. To undertake now to give the historical facts of those early days would require more research than the author has been able to give, and might involve controversy into which he does not care to enter. It appears likely that methods nearly like the present "single order" were the earliest tried, and these seem to have been more widely used than the "duplicate." The latter was at least not long behind the other. It was originated and carefully worked up in several independent quarters, and from these it has been adopted by others. The author has never used any other method. Adopting it in 1863, it was in use for some years before he was aware that others were in the same path, who may have commenced at a still earlier date.
The closing paragraph of the first edition of this work was as follows:
"This method is growing in favor, and one object of the author will have been attained if this discussion shall aid in promoting its general adoption."
In preparing this second edition the fact has constantly appeared that the former words of recommendation related to points which are now realized facts on a majority of our railroads and that the method then urged has now reached the then desired position of "general adoption."