Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 284, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 November 1916 — HAS BUT ONE RAIL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HAS BUT ONE RAIL

IRIBH LINE 18 SOMETHING OF A CURIOSITY. Only Ten Miles In Length, but System Employed Makes It Unique—“ Atmospheric Railroad" •• Another Freak Idea. The most curious railroad In existence today Is, without a doubt, the Lis* towel & Bullybunlon railroad, In the west of Ireland. This little line, whose length Is only ten miles, is quaint alike In its nurne and in the system employed. Although an Irish railroad, the system Is the Invention of a French engineer, and Is known as the “Lartigue single rail elevated railroad.” The “single rail,” It should be added, does not mean a single trnck railroad. It actually has only one rail for engine and train to run on. ■ . The rail is supported on Iron trestles at a height of three feet three inches from the ground, and the locomotive and train are actually balanced on it. The carriages hang down on each side of the line, and passengers in them sitting back to buck. All this is suflieiently curious, but the locomotives of this extraordinary line are the most eccentric looking of objects ever seen in waking hours or

out of nightmares. They are bulTt with twin boilers and smokestacks, and between them is a huge headlight resembling those in use on American and Canadian railroads. There has alwnys been some question as to how our English standard railroad gauge came into existence at the measurement of four feet eight and one-half inches. The generally-received opinion is that this was the gauge in use at the collieries when George Stephenson first conceived the idea of the locomotive engine. A very curious tram line survival on Dartmoor takes us back to the days before steam railroads. This is the granite tramway originally laid down for the purpose of conveying the granite hewn out near Hey Tor for the rebuilding of London bridge. Long, grooved lengths of granite were placed along the hillside, and on these the stone was conveyed down to the Sover canal at Teigngrace, and thence floated by barge to Teignmouth. Arrived there, it was transferred to sailing ships for London. -—„ — Not very much of this primitive granite railroad remains at Hey Tor among the heather and the bracken, for tnS farmers, being frugal persons, have removed most of the lengths to serve as rubbing posts for their cattle. An Air Pressure Line.Along the main line of the Great Western railroad in South Devon there are some curious survivals of systems once the pets of celebrated engineers, and as such tried and found unsatisfactory. Thus, when you come to Starcross, where the line runs so picturesquely along the salt water estuary of the Exe, a tall red sandstone tower will be noticed, adjoining the station. It is quite an ornament in the distant view, and gives rather an Italian air to the surroundings. This and another building at Totnes are the only surviving evidences of a system invented by Brunei. This was the “atmospheric railroad,” by

which trains were to be drawn along by air pressure in pipes laid down alongside the line. The "South Devon railroad,” as It was then, was built by him with the Idea of doing without locomotive engines. Tlye only engines to be employed were to be those in these engine houses creating air pressure. The method was tried at great cost, and after almost ruinous expense had to be abandoned. Meanwhile, the buildi&gs—let off for various purposes —serve as reminders of q curious incident in railroad his-tory-—Londop Answers.

The One-Rail Irish Express.

Relic of Air Pressure Railroad.