358 RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION. 



main lines will have to be reduced to the smallest possible 

 number. 



It would be difficult to form an opinion as to how far pas- 

 senger traffic will go on expanding, but if it continues to increase 

 at the same rate as at present, some railways may find it ex- 

 pedient, and even absolutely necessary, to construct new lines 

 altogether separate and apart from the existing routes, and for 

 the sole use of their fast through traffic. As roadside or inter- 

 mediate traffic would not form any part of the scheme, such 

 lines could be laid out so as to keep away from the populous 

 districts, where property would be costly, and pass instead 

 through those parts of the open country where the most direct 

 course and easiest gradients could be obtained. Stations would 

 only be required at the very large and important places, and at 

 long distances from each other. Lines of this description, 

 reserved for through traffic only, taken alone, might not pay, but 

 taken in conjunction with the existing lines, of which they 

 would form a part, they might prove to be the best solution of 

 the problem of dealing with a crowded train service, the re- 

 munerative earnings of which, placed together, might yield a 

 rich return over the entire system. A project for a separate 

 through line might at first appear a little startling, but we have 

 well-known precedents in the vast expenditure already incurred 

 in the constructing of enormous viaducts and connecting lines 

 to avoid long detours on certain through routes. The widening 

 out of an ordinary double line into a four-line road was at first 

 considered as a rather venturesome departure ; and it must 

 always be costly because, in addition to the earthworks and 

 permanent way, there is the doubling of all the over and under 

 bridges and waterways, besides the great and expensive altera- 

 tions at stations. Practically it is almost like making a second 

 railway, and yet the constant extension of the principle is an 

 admission that the working results have proved satisfactory, in 

 spite of the large outlay. A little later the question will force 

 itself more prominently into notice, whether the four-line track 

 or the separate fast through traffic lines, will best answer the 

 purpose. The former possesses certain advantages, but the latter 

 would give more freedom for high-speed running. 



Engineers have brought railways to their present stage of 

 perfection, and the public will expect them to devise and carry 

 out still further improvements as the march of development 



