. The Street railway journal . h the case isaltogether different. Here the wear and tear on the head is so rapidthat the corrosion has no chance, and the number of cars is so greatthat the ordinary traffic is in a great degree driven off the lines, so thatthis also has no chance to wear down the flange and assist in keepingit level with the top of the rail. It is facts like these which bring into prominent relief the enor-mous advantages we should have in Birmingham by the adoption of arail with a central groove, such as the Liverpool rail. Twelve yearsor so ago, when the Birmingham corporatio
. The Street railway journal . h the case isaltogether different. Here the wear and tear on the head is so rapidthat the corrosion has no chance, and the number of cars is so greatthat the ordinary traffic is in a great degree driven off the lines, so thatthis also has no chance to wear down the flange and assist in keepingit level with the top of the rail. It is facts like these which bring into prominent relief the enor-mous advantages we should have in Birmingham by the adoption of arail with a central groove, such as the Liverpool rail. Twelve yearsor so ago, when the Birmingham corporation was going to commencethe construction of an extensive system of tramways, there was a des-perate attempt made to induce it to adopt this rail; the Board ofTrade held an enquiry at the Council House, but the corporation hadhad enough of compound rails, and insisted upon using the girder sec-tion, shown in Fig. r, in spite of the advantages which the centralgroove offered. Subsequent experience has fully justified the decision. FIG. 1. FIG. 2. then arrived at, seeing that the central groove then meant a compoundrail, which compound rail was certainly unsuitable for the steam trac-tion that was going to be used on the tramways. I know of but onecase where the Liverpool rail was used on steam tramways, and thatwas the line from Dudley to Wolverhampton. Looking at the ques-tion solely from the point of view of the public interests, I am stronglyof opinion that the girder rail, similar to that now in use in Birming-ham, but with a central groove, is the only form of rail which is suitablefor use on a steam tramway in a public street. To turn now to the question of joints, it may be remembered thatin my former paper I described two or three forms of joints, of whichtrial had been made. The original form, as shown in Fig. 1, waspainfully wanting in all elements of permanence. Assisted by a sole-plate it was vastly improved, but still a long way from perfection. Ialso described a form
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, bookidstreetrailwa, bookyear1884
