WHISHAW ON RAILWAYS.
THE numbet of proposed new railways before Parliament, for England and Wales, is 4S: their length is 1,233 miles : the esti- mated amount of their cost, 19,352,0001. The length of the tun-
nelling is 25 miles; the number of bridges, exclusive of viaducts and culverts, 2,825. More than 190,000 tons of iron are re- quired for the rails, and more than 23 millions of tons of' stone for the !decks. And, if carried into execution, these railways will employ for three years, at least, 5,000 men and 1,500 horses.
The Railways projected, but abandoned for the present session, are 27: they are 794 miles in length ; the tunnelling 81 miles, and the bridges 1,595. • The Railways in progress, in England and Wales, are 19; of which none are finished, unless it be the Greenwich. The esti- mated amount of their cost was 16,782,0001.; and their length is 846 miles. The railways for which acts were obtained in the session of 1836 were 26, with capitals amounting to 15,384,0001.; and of these only seven are in progress.
This enumeration gives an idea of magnitude and money, but is too vast to impress the mind with a definite notion of the diffi- culties to be surmounted in executing these works, the trouble to be undergone, and the skill that must be displayed. A detailed account of the number of roads and rivers to be crossed, and the modes of crossing them on one railway, will convey the best no- tion of these points. The following summary is taken from Mr. WHISHAW'S analysis of the Brighton Railway without a tunnel.
" This line, according to the Parliamentary section, is intended to cross seven- teen turnpike. roads, three to be passed over the railway and fourteen under; thirty. seven highways and parish-roads, nineteen over and eighteen under; seventy no:ovation-roads and private carriage-roads, thilty over and forty under ; five foot.paths, two over and three ; thirty•two brooks, streams, &c., two over and thirty under. The Heeding turnpike. road is proposed to be diverted. The West Grinstead cut is 25 feet under the level of the rails. The Croyden tramw.iy is to be passed under, 22 feet 6 inches below the rails. The river \Yeah; is crossed at an elevation of 24 feet above the water's surface; the river Hogsmill at 41 feet 6 inches; the river Adur 20 fret; and the 3lole is thrice crossed, twice at 33 and once at 25 feet above the water's surface at each point of crossing revectively."
There is probably no other country with sufficient wealth to execute such a number of gigantic undertakings. There is cer- tainly no other people who would so readily part with their money to forward projects, all of them embracing risk, and very many from which a sufficient return to yield a profit on the outlay cannot obvi- ously be expected for years, if at all. A critical account of exist- ing, embryo, and extinct railway projects, by an engineer who was also a sensible man of the world and not untinctured with econo- mical science, would be useful and interesting : it would partake still more of these qualities, if he could add their secret history, both ditectorial and senatorial, with sketches of the respectable, honourable, and noble swindlers who act in these melodramas, and accounts of their frauds.
But " something is better than nothing ;" and for the present we must rest satisfied with Mr. WHISHAVS very complete and busisees-like performance of the task be has undertaken. The Analysis promised in his titlepage is redeemed in the body of the work. Each of the eighty projects that have ben brought for- ward in the present year, is examined methodically and minutely. Their line is traced; their curves (a defect in a rail- road, as limiting the speed of the engine) are noted ; their various planes, whether level, ascending, or descending, are tabularly presented, with their respective lengths, localities, and rates of inclination ; the crossings of roads and rivers are enumerated, as our quotation has shown ; and some remarks are appended to each speculation,-which vi mild have had more interest had the criticism been freer. Various tables of railway statistics are added, ith a glossary of technical terms.
Of course the work is chiefly intended for those who take a
scientific or pecuidary interest in railroads- for those who ex- ecute, and Rano who pay. Yet to persons acqeainted with the localities eta line, there is a sort of pleasure felt in tracing it out ; marking the difficulties it must encounter and overcome; shrink- ing from the idea of the rural beauty it will spit or lessen ; and pietui ing the horror it will occasion in the minds ol. many lovers of gentility and quiet, when their exclusiveness is shocked and their repose disturbed by a weekly importation of Cueknies.
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