We have already shown the expense of formation in railways to be greatly influenced by a portion of the power employed being unavailable, and that the road is levelled as a convenience for the propelling power, not the traffic conveyed. We have also shown that the destruction to the road is attributable to the weight and shocks of the engines, not of the trains; that the enormous expense of locomotive power and coke arises from the bad application of power and the artificial means employed to work engines at an unnatural speed. In other words, all the expenses have been traced home to the use of locomotive engines, which have, from the opening of railways for passenger traffic to the present day, been a source of continual annoyance and vexation; breakage after breakage has occurred, and been succeeded by increasing the weight and power of the machines; this in turn has led to the necessity of increasing the strength and stability of the rails and foundations on which they travel, and increasing the strength of the passenger-carriages, to resist any shocks they may occasionally receive from their ponderous neighbour;-until we have arrived at this conclusion, that on an iron railroad, where the surface is by comparison smooth and the track marked out, a carriage to convey eighteen passengers must weigh about 3 tons, while over a rough paved road an omnibus weighing only 1 ton will perform the same amount of duty. Here are facts which must at once convince every one that there are in the present system, radical defects to be weeded out if no remedy were suggested, it might be difficult for Railway Companies to determine how to extricate themselves from their present position; but under existing circumstances their position is by no means a difficult one. The Atmospheric Railway has been tested by actual operation at the entire expense of the inventors and their friends. The public have not been asked to support it, or even encourage it, until it has been clearly proved beyond all doubt to merit confidence from its general usefulness. It has claims to notice both in a national and commercial point of view; for while it will afford the means of railway communication to second and third-rate towns by the small outlay necessary for the formation and working, it will enable the proprietors of railway enterprises already established or in course of formation, to realize that return for their capital which they so richly deserve, and which under the present system they so hopelessly look for. 1 THE atmospheric principle for propelling carriages on a railway being fully proved, we shall now describe its applicability to Turnpike Roads for the conveyance of merchandise, farming stock, &c., &c. By a reduction of velocity, say from 35 miles per hour, the ordinary safe speed on an Atmospheric Railway, to 12 miles per hour, this system of locomotion can be applied to any mail-coach road in Great Britain. The expense of working on this plan has already been shown to be so trifling that goods may be conveyed 100 miles for 6s. 3d. per ton, and passengers the same distance for 5s. each. This rate will pay all tolls to the turnpike road, and leave a handsome dividend for the outlay of capital. All the expenses before cited being equally applicable to turnpike roads, and having been deduced from what has been already done, the whole would be taken by contract at the prices herein stated; therefore, there can be no mistake on that head. The expenses are thus strongly insisted on because the cheapness of conveyance is so far beyond what could be contemplated, that if it were less confidently stated it might by some be thought an exaggeration. In converting a turnpike road into a double line of Atmospheric Railway, the Macadamised part of the road is left entire for ordinary traffic, and the railway is crossed without bridges at the different partings. The velocity being reduced to 12 miles per hour, sharp curves will be turned with ease; all dangers will be avoided, as the carriages can be stopped in an instant in case of carts crossing the line, or any other obstruction, or to take up passengers and parcels; they will pass along the main street of a country town without pipe, and be in every respect as subservient to the conductor as a common stage coach to the driver. Independently of the ample remuneration to be derived by those who embark their capital in this plan, of what vast importance will it be for a commercial country like this to have the produce of one part conveyed to another at so slight an expense and so rapid a rate! The live stock will no longer be driven. The poorest traveller will find it an extravagance to walk. Farming produce will be conveyed to a market-town so quickly and cheaply that it will be as fresh and almost as cheap on reaching its place of destination, as in the producing country. E |