Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 260, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 November 1910 — ELECTRICITY VERSUS STEAM [ARTICLE]

ELECTRICITY VERSUS STEAM

Inventors Have Much to Accomplish Before Motor Generally Displaces the Engine. The electrification of steam railroads is steadily becoming a nearer possibility, although the Inventors have yet much to accomplish before the motor generally displaces the engine. The opening wedge comes in the form of electrification of terminals in the largest cities, where conditions of heavy passenger traffic prevail and where the greatest objection Is made to the smoke nuisance, says H. H. Windsor in Popular Mechanics. Progress along these lines has been made in New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore, and other large cities are likely to follow,'in the next few years. The railroads claim that substitution of electricity for steam out on the main lines would Involve prohibitltfe losses by making junk of millions of dollars’ worth of steam locomotives. This, however. Is misleading and far from true, for during the several years necessarily consumed in changing over, say, 1,000 miles of trunk line, the future would be taken Into consideration. As fast as the steam locomotives on one division were released they would be transferred to other divisions to take the place of wornouts there, and at last there would be branch lines of their own and smaller roads which would absorb a great part of what motive power remained at the finish. There would be some direct loss, and some indirect, such as placing on branch lines heavier and faster locomotives than the business required; but the loss from this Item would be only a fraction of the whole. There would be other millions of dollars, now invested in locomotive repair shops, thrown out of use, hut this would bring its own compensation, for the electric locomotive goes to the shop only two or three times a year, where the steam locomotive must be overhauled constantly. Moreover, the cost of repairs to the electric machine is insignificant compared to the cost of maintenance of the steam locomotive. The elimination of smoke, cinders and sparks will contribute to the comfort and luxury of long-distance travel quite as much as did the air brake when it displaced the hand brake.