590                 A. M. E. REVIEW.

careful to develop the Dammond system as an automatic
cab system.
  There are thousands of miles of steam railway track in
America which are now protected by automatic block sys-
tems. Of course, in these installations, the automatic sig-
nals are used in the yards and in the vicinity of stations as
well as "out on the line." In the United States there are
yards where the congestion of traffic is as great as can be
found anywhere in England and in which the automatic
block system is employed. A United States government
report of January 1, 1908, shows, in round numbers, forty-
seven thousand nine hundred miles of steam road in that
country operated under manual signals. Owing to the great
number of American wrecks on manually signalled roads and
to the fact that, especially where traffic is dense, manual
signals are considerably more expensive to operate than
automatic signals, the better (that is the automatic) form
of fixed signals is largely replacing the manual block sig-
nals in that country.
  For instance, in a report dated November 22, 1909, the
United States Block Signal and Train Central Board states
that the New York Central and the New York, New Haven
and Hartford Railroads "are now taking some of these"
(that is manual block) "signals out of service and putting
up automatic signals in place of them. * * * Several sec-
tions," (of the New York Central main line between Buf-
falo and New York City) "aggregating about fifty miles of
line, have been changed already, and it appears to be the in-
tention to supercede the manual by the automatic on the
whole of the four hundred and forty miles between the
cities named, the larger part of which is four-track line."
  Assuming that England will not long remain so far be-
hind America as she undoubtedly is in the important matter
of substituting automatic for manual block systems, and
recognizing the fact that England is already far ahead of
America as to cab signals, it would seem that the time is




			

OHS/National Afro-American Museum & Cultural Center Serial Collection

African Methodist Episcopal Church Review, Vol. 28, Num. 2

Volume:  28
Issue Number:  02
Date:  10/1911