Page:The Working and Management of an English Railway.djvu/33

 magnitude, and with a constantly fluctuating but nearly always growing, traffic, the Executive at headquarters is daily inundated with suggestions and recommendations for alterations and increased accommodation at stations and depôts, but these undergo a very searching examination before any effect is given to them. We will suppose, for example, that a goods agent conceives it to be necessary for an additional siding to be laid down at a station. He makes a report to that effect to the Manager of the district; the latter inquires into the facts on the spot, and, if he concurs in the necessity, reports his recommendation to the General Manager. The latter consults, in the first instance, the Chief Goods Manager or the Superintendent of the line, as the case may be, and, if his report be favourable, authorises the Engineer to prepare a plan and estimate. The plan, when ready, is subjected to the criticism of the District Officer, the Chief Officer, and of the General Manager, and, if all are satisfied, the Directors are next asked to authorise the necessary outlay. But even this is not all, for, finally, the plan has to be signed by the Chairman of the Company before the Engineer commences operations, and that gentleman, who keeps a watchful guard over the Company's purse strings, has to be convinced that the expenditure is not only desirable, but actually unavoidable, before his signature is obtained. Thus the shareholders may rest perfectly easy in the assurance that their money is not dissipated in needless accommodation works.

One very important part of the management of a railway, as may be easily imagined, is the arrangement of the train service. The entire service is re-organised twice in the year, viz., in the spring, to provide for the