In conducting their business of passenger and freight transportation, railways all over the world were, last year, faced with difficulties innumerable. Apart from the anxious days of the Great War, there probably never was a time when so many perplexing problems had to be met. Yet, taking all in all, railway records for 1930 almost everywhere give cause for satisfaction. There is scarcely a country in the world that did not make real progress in the railway field last year, and while prophecy may be the most dangerous of pastimes, it seems comparatively safe to predict increased railway prosperity throughout the globe during the coming twelve months. Railways are anything but a back number, despite the rapid growth of competitive means of movement. During 1931 it is up to railwaymen the world over to leave no stone unturned to prove the superiority of the “Iron Way” as a carrier of mankind and mankind's belongings.