Page:The Working and Management of an English Railway.djvu/294

256 had prepared with the view of demonstrating what he believed to be the unproductive character of the first and second class traffic upon the principal railways, consequent upon the altered policy which had been brought about since 1873, and to which reference has been made. These calculations assumed the form of an analysis of the passenger receipts and working expenses of the London and North Western Railway during a long period of years, viz., from i860 to 1884, and as they impressed me very much at the time as showing striking results, and bearing out to a great extent the conclusions at which I had already arrived, it may be worth while to give a brief abstract of them in this connection.

Mr. Williams' figures, which were most carefully prepared, showed that from i860 to 1871 the net profits from first and second class continued to be over 50 per cent, of the gross receipts, although the average gross receipts per passenger and per train mile were gradually reduced. In 1873, the first year in which the policy of attaching third class carriages to all trains was brought fully to bear, although the gross receipts from first-class traffic continued to increase, there was a larger growth in the working expenses, and the first class net receipts therefore fell off from 2s. 9½d to 2s. 3¼d. per passenger, and from 7⅓d. to 5¾d. per train mile. The second class suffered to an even greater extent, the number of passengers of that class having decreased from 8,281,366 in 1871 to 5,418,494 in 1873, and the gross receipts from £867,099 to £557,200. The second class net receipts fell from is. 3d. per passenger to 9d., and the net receipts per train mile from 10d. to not quite 4d. The third class receipts, as might have been expected, were very largely increased.

Coming to the year 1875, the year in which second