234 



NEW YOKE. 



The works in New York are intended to supply 320 millions 

 of gallons of water daily to the city. The works consist of a 

 masonry dam 178 feet high, 1 ,300 feet long, and impounding 

 3,200 millions of gallons. The masonry dam has to be sunk 

 100 feet to reach rock foundation, so that its total height will 

 be nearly 300 feet, and its bottom width 200 feet. The water 

 will be conveyed by an aqueduct with its diameter averaging 

 twelve feet, and will be 31 miles long to the Central Park 

 Reservoir. The aqueduct crosses the Harlem River by means 

 of a syphon 156 feet below the surface of the river. 



KAILWAYS. 



Some interesting information has been compiled in a paper 

 read before the American Society of Civil Engineers, " English 

 and American Eailroads compared," by Mr. B. Dorsey. He 

 states that in 1883 there were in England 18,681 miles of rail- 

 way, costing over £40,000 per mile, and at the same date there 

 were completed in America 110,414 miles, costing on an aver- 

 average £12,400 per mile ; the operating expenses of the 

 English lines being £2,000, and of the American, £880 per 

 mile. The ton mileage of the English was 9,589,786,848 and 

 of the American 44,064,923,445, and passenger mileage 

 5,494,801,496 and 8,817,684,503 respectively. 



Assuming that the above statements are correct, considerable 

 allowance must be made for the difference in the value of the 

 land traversed by the railways in the two countries, and, 

 although the cost of floating railway companies in America 

 is great — amounting in some instances to £2,000 to £3,000 

 per mile — yet w r hen you value the different conditions under 

 which the work is carried out in the two countries, there is no 

 doubt that railways can be and are made more economically in 

 America than in England, and a perusal of an excellent paper 

 written by Mr. Robert Grordon before the Institution of Civil 

 Engineers will throw much additional information upon the 

 subject. This paper is " On the Economical Construction and 

 Operation of Railways in countries where small returns are ex- 

 pected, as exemplified by America." This subject, although of 

 great interest to us as colonists, would occupy too much time to 

 enter into on the present occasion, but I will briefly refer to 

 one or two points mentioned in the above paper. 



The author attributes one of the great and essential features 

 in the American as compared with English practice to the 

 adoption of types capable of automatic reproduction in identical 

 forms where practicable. In one case alone, the whole railway 

 system of America will shortly be of one universal gauge of 



