The life of George Stephenson, railway engineer - Lighthouse ...

460 RAILWAY SYSTEM AND ITS RESULTS.
A very important question presents itself as to the mode of meeting
this heavy annual depreciation. The practice of some Railway Com-
panies has been to set aside a fund, to make good the waste of material
in the permanent way. With many Companies the amount which
has been, or which ought to be thus set aside, as a Renewal Fund, has
frequently occasioned great conflict of opinion. Among engineers
there is, no doubt, much discussion on the details and various bearings
of the question. Perhaps, however, it may be well to consider whether
there really is any good argument for a renewal fund at all.
When a railway is first opened, everything being new, the annual
depreciation will for some time go on in an increasing ratio. But it is
obvious, that there must be a period in the age of the railway, when
that annually-increasing ratio of depreciation must cease, and when
the sum required for regular restoration and repair must become fixed
and (except under extraordinary circumstances) almost cei-tain. This
may be illustrated by the case of an Insurance Company. Probably
in the first year of the existence of such a company it sustains no loss
by death, and in the second and third years only one or two lives drop.
For some succeeding years the losses from this source increase in an
augmenting ratio. But a period arrives,.when the annual decrement
of life becomes fixed, and except in the case of pestilence or other
extraordinary occurrence, nearly certain. As it is with humanity, so
it is with rails and sleepers. The depreciation, small at first, increases
gradually, until at length it arrives at an average, and becomes fixed
and nearly certain every year. This being so, why should an extra-
ordinary special fund be set aside to provide for renewals and repairs ?
Those renewals and repairs are, under such circumstances, as well
established a charge as the salaries of officers or the cost of fuel. If
there is to be a Renewal Fund, the true principle would seem to be,
to set aside a considerable sum in the earlier years of a railway, untU
the period when the average is reached, after which time the repairs
should be a regular charge upon receipts.
The argument by which a Renewal Fund is supported, is the assumed
desirability of equalizing dividends ; but it has been already
stated, that there has never been a case where the gross annual receipts
of a railway have duninished. The growth of a railway is, and
must be progressive, save under very exceptional circumstances. Not
only does the very existence of a railway furnish excitement for trade
and create taste for travel, but our population increases at the rate
of 15 per cent, in every decade, which of itself affords assurance that,
apart from transitory causes of disturbance, the traffic of railways
must increase. The ground for a Renewal Fund is removed by these