THE RAILWAY.

Southland Times, Volume 2, Issue 2, 15 May 1863, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE RAILWAY.

An average day's work of the railways of the United Kingdom in 1861 was to carry 5,080,000 passengers, 253,000 tons of minerals and merchandise, 35,000 live stock, 1,000 dogs, and 740 horsps. The precise number of travellers of the_ year cannot be stated, because there is no record of the journeys of season ticket- \ holders ; but it must have been more than six times the number of the population of the United Kingdom. The trains, passenger and goods trains added together, travelled 2,897,748 miles more in 1861 than in 1860, which is equivalent to going round the world 116 times more last year than in the year before. 3,881,990 trains ran in the course of the year ; that ts to say, upwards of 10,600 a day. If the trains had beeen equally distributed, ruuning day and night without ceasing, ihey would have travelled among them 200 miles in every minute. The length of the line open increased by 436 miles, and became 10,869 miles ; and the gross receipts of the year L 28,565,355, considerably exceeded the interest of the national debt, and amounted to about 8 per cent, on the capital. The total raised l»y shares and loans increased from L 348 .130,127, at the end of 1860, to L 362 ,12 7,338 an increase of more than Ll4 000,000 in the year. The working expenditure rose to above 48 per cent, and the net receipts only increased by L 130.000, or less than one per cent, on the increase bfcapital. The net receipts were over 4 per cent oathe capital;* 284 T persons were kiired^upou- r?iiltayß in th£ course of the year, "atfi. 883 injured j fcutx

the accidents to passenger trains in which passengers were killed or injured were but 43 in number, causing the death of 46 passengers and injury to 781 more— one passenger killed orinjured in about;22o,ooo In addition to this 14 accidents were reported to the. Board of Trade, in which no passengers was injured, and 20 passengers were killed through getting- into or out of trains in motion, and 13 more through their own misconduct or want of caution. The number ofpasseflgers killed or injured, not through such rashness, but from causes beyond their own control, was — in 1858, 445; in 1859, 384; in 1860, 509; in 1861, 827. In the latter year, the sum of L 135,062 was paid as compensation for personal injury. 128 servants of the companies, or of the contractors, were killed in the year, 57 trespassers and 17 persons crossing at level crossings. — Times.