IN THE PUBLIC EYE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8172, 30 June 1906, Page 3

IN THE PUBLIC EYE.

MR R. W. PERKS, M.P.

It is telieved in many quarters "both in Euglaud and America that the days of tbe steam locomotive are numbered, and consequently those of the train that is drawn by it. Already they have the electric train in some parts of tbe Spates, bat the completest electric railway in the world ia the Metropolitan District Railway Company of Eugland which through the energy of the chairman has become "eleotri:fied''and now has none of its old -rolling stock in usp. A remarkable feature of tbe transition was it was accomplishes without disturbing the •traffic of the line -in the slightest. The permanent way was used in its existiuc furm and the "electric" •additions merely laid along the route between the rails and alongside onp rail, and by tbe time the work was done tbe new rolling stock was ready to displace the old one. This consisted uearly wholly of a change of engines, all tbe steam looomotives being condemned, though there were not a few additions to make in the carriages, some of them associated with tbe brake. When was completed tbe transition was made with but the slightest ceremony. One night tbe last steam locomotive drew its train and was ran into its shed, and next morning the first electric engine came out .and took tbe first electric train to be vran in England over the appointed route. Interviewed on the subjeot, Mr Perks, Chairman of the Metropolitan Electric Railway Company, declared that the change from steam to eleotricity was made with comparative ease, and the cost was not so serious as to be viewed with any regret, as it was well under £1,400,000. From such an experience and taking into consideration 'the superior excellence of tbe electrio service be had no hesitation in forecasting the end of the steam locomotive right through Groat Britain and in every other country as fast -■a& existing circumstances might allow. The tests held in A raerioa to prove the rival merits of both •leave no question as to the superiority ofglhe electric serviue. Side by side on a double pair of rails an electric train was run against a steam train for fifty miles, and the former, to use some turf jargon, did what it liked with the other, and was never pressed. The elebtrio locomotive is cleaner than the steam locomotive,, is lesß noisy, is more able to negotiate grades, and ■is comoarably stronger and swiftni. .A -first-class electric looomotive twill draw a train that the equivalent steam, locomotive ooulda't look at," aud it will do its forty , fifty, and sixty ciles an hour with ease, grades curves and all. The fastest time ever done by a steam locomotive running by itself is a little over 80 miles an hour; but tbe time of the eleotria engine in tbe same circumstances is over one hundred. For all tiuoh reasons, and because as a final, it is more economoal, Mr Perks is convinced that the star of tbe electrio locomotive haft risen brightly, and that of tbe one that hag , done bo much good -service for over fifty years grown dim with the prospect of finally setting.