A Year of Progress

Sleeping Compartment on the London-Paris Service, via Dover-Dunkirk Train-Ferry.

A Happy New Year to all! At this season comes fresh hope and inspiration, and railwaymen in both New Zealand and Great Britain start the New Year in the cheerful knowledge that never was the transportation machine in better shape than at present. A wonderful year, indeed, was 1937, with the Coronation as an outstanding event. For the Home railways it was a period of progress in every branch. Both passenger and freight traffic showed marked improvement, and on the passenger side, in particular, there were recorded many spectacular developments, notably under the head of streamlined express operation, on the north-going lines out of London.

Normally, passenger train services are cut to a considerable degree on the Home railways during the winter months. This winter, however, the cuts have been much less drastic than in previous years—a sure index of the return of more prosperous days. Fast running, too, is a feature of the winter schedules. To take as an example the London, Midland & Scottish line, the winter time-tables show some 62 passenger trains making regular journeys at start-to-stop average speeds of 60 m.p.h. or over, these trains covering an aggregate daily distance of 6,145 miles at such speeds. These figures compare with 29 trains and 2,633 miles per day the previous winter. Actually, the L. M. & S. Railway this winter inaugurated the biggest speed-up on record of its services between London (St. Pancras), Leicester, Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds and Bradford. Wholesale cuts—up to 42 minutes per train—have been effected in the running times between these places, the time-table reorganisation involved being the largest of its kind ever undertaken.