Canadian Forestrij Journal, June, 1918 



1731 



nished that such fires were not 

 caused by the railways. 



(i) Each railway company is re- 

 quired to submit a report to the 

 Board with respect to every fire 

 which burns over more than 100 

 square feet outsidie the right of iway 

 in what is classified as a forest 

 section. These reports are checked 

 and supplemented by reports from 

 officers of the Fire Inspection De- 

 partment. 



The fire protection work of the 

 railway companies is supervised by 

 the field staff of the Fire Inspection 

 Department of the Board. This staff 

 is not a special set of men employed 

 by the Board, but is made up of 

 employees of the various forestry 

 and fire-protective organizations of 

 the Dominion and provincial gov- 

 ernments, each such organization 

 working within its own territory, 

 and each such employee being ap- 

 pointed an officer of the Board under 

 a co-operative arrangement estab- 

 lished immediately following the is- 

 suance of the Board's fire regulations 

 in 1912. This plan has for the most 

 part worked out admirably during 

 the six and one-half seasons it has 

 been in effect. The railway com- 

 panies have, with few exceptions, 

 co-operated efficiently, and the fire 

 loss, due to railway causes, '""as 

 decreased to such an extent at thht 

 railways now give promise of becom- 

 ing minor instead of major agencies 

 in causing loss by forest firec. In 

 many cases, the railways have been 

 effective in checking fires which came 

 in from a distance, and for the 

 origin of which they were in no wise 

 responsible. 



Canadian Government Railways 



The Canadian Government Rail- 

 ways total some 4,565 miles, or 

 nearly 12 per cent, of the total for 

 Canada. Lines included in this sys- 

 tem are the Intercolonial, National 

 Transcontinental, New Brunswick, 

 and Prince Edward Island, Inter- 

 national of New Brunswick, Prince 

 Edward Island, St. John Valley, 

 Quebec and Saguenay, Elgin and 

 Havelock, Moncton and Buctouche, 

 St. Martins, York and Carleton, 



and Salisbury and Albert. The ac- 

 quisition of the last named line is 

 effective July 1, and of the four 

 preceding, June 1. Negotiations are 

 still under way for the purchase of 

 the Kent Northern and Caraquet 

 and Gulf Shore, under recent legis- 

 lation. 



The Hudson Bay Railway, ex- 

 tending northeasterly from Pas, Man- 

 itoba, is still in the construction 

 stage and is being operated by the 

 contractors. 



The question of fire protection 

 along Government Railways has been 

 a live issue for many years. In 

 former years there was much criti- 

 cism, and the matter has been subject 

 of repeated representations by the 

 Conservation Commission, Forestry 

 Association, provincial governments, 

 timber owners, and forest protective 

 associations. The Department of 

 Railways and Canals, which has the 

 administration of these lines, has 

 repeatedly pledged itself to the adop- 

 tion of the same standards relative 

 to fire protection as are in effect on 

 lines under the jurisdiction of the 

 Railway Commission. 



Great improvement has unques- 

 tionably taken place during recent 

 years. However, there seems only 

 too good reasons, for the opinion that 

 this work has not yet uniformly 

 reached the standard set by the 

 BoaJ^d's regulations for lines under 

 its jurisdiction. It is believed that 

 so far as this deficiency exists, it is 

 due rather to lack of special organiza- 

 tion involving specialized overhead 

 supervision and inspection, rather 

 than to any lack of intent on the part 

 of officials to maintain a uniformly 

 high standard in the work of fire pre- 

 vention and control. The usefulness 

 of local specialized inspection in 

 bringing about improved conditions 

 with reference to fire prevention and 

 control along Dominion chartered 

 railways has been conclusively demon- 

 strated through the Fire Inspection 

 Department of the Railway Com- 

 mission. This is quite natural, since 

 railway employees, especially when 

 there is a shortage of labor, may be 

 expected to pay most attention to 



