A Well-Managed Railway System

Happy indeed is the railway situation in mountainous Switzerland, Australia's western neighbour. The Swiss railways are, indeed, one of the most prosperous transportation concerns in the world, and incidentally one of the best managed. The Swiss Federal Railways report for 1928, recently issued, shows gross earnings for the year as 420,167,809 francs, with expenditure totalling 268,560,076 francs, leaving a surplus of 151,607,733 francs. This figure exceeds the revenue total of 1927 by 23,132,851 francs. During 1928, the Swiss State Railways handled 120 million passengers, an increase of nearly six per cent. over 1927, while on the freight side there were handled 19 million metric tons, an increase over 1927 of six and a half per cent.

Switzerland its pushing rapidly ahead with electrification plans. At January 1, 1929, the Swiss Federal Railways owned 345 electric locomotives for main-line traffic, 20 electric shunting locomotives, 603 normal-guage steam locomotives, and 31 narrow-gauge steam locomotives. Sixty-one of the electric locomotives, it is interesting to note, are equipped for one-man control, a feature enabling vast savings to be made in running expenses.

Switzerland, apart from being one of the leaders in railway electrification, is also to the fore in the development of combined rail and air transport. In Europe, air travel is gradually growing in popularity as its safety becomes more assured, and the strangeness associated with the new form of movement wears off. From the Croydon Air Port, near London, regular British Flying services operate to and from Pairs, Brussels, Cologne and Zurich, while French, German, and other foreign machines also give connection between London and various important continental centres. During 1928, British aircraft in the services named, flew 793,365 miles, without one fatal mishap.—(From our London Correspondent.)