and the packhorse was even slower. Amid such conditions the idea of railways would have been slow to germinate had not a catastrophe furnished some impetus. In 1869 a rice-famine occurred in the southern island, Kiūshiū, and while the cereal was procurable abundantly in the northern provinces, people in the south perished of hunger owing to lack of transport facilities. Sir Harry Parkes, British representative in Tōkyō, seized this occasion to urge the construction of railways. Ito and Okuma, then influential members of the government, at once recognized the wisdom of his advice. Arrangements were made for a loan of a million sterling in London on the security of the customs revenue, and English engineers were engaged to lay a line between Tōkyō and Yokohama (18 m.). Vehement voices of opposition were at once raised in private and official circles alike, all persons engaged in transport business imagined themselves threatened with ruin, and conservative patriots detected loss of national independence in a foreign loan. So fierce was the antagonism that the military authorities refused to permit operations of survey in the southern suburb of Tōkyō, and the road had to be laid on an embankment constructed in the sea. Ito and Okuma, however, never flinched, and they were ably supported by Marquis M. Inouye and M. Mayejima. The latter published, in 1870, the first Japanese work on railways, advocating the building of lines from Tōkyō to Kiōto and Osaka; the former, appointed superintendent of the lines, held that post for 30 years, and is justly spoken of as “the father of Japanese railways.”
September 1872 saw the first official opening of a railway (the Tōkyō-Yokohama line) in Japan, the ceremony being performed by the emperor himself, a measure which effectually silenced all further opposition. Eight years from the time of turning the first sod saw 71 m. of road open to traffic, the northern section being that between Tōkyō and Yokohama, and the southern that between Kiōto and Kobe. A period of interruption now ensued, owing to domestic troubles and foreign complications, and when, in 1878, the government was able to devote attention once again to railway problems, it found the treasury empty. Then for the first time a public works loan was floated in the home market, and about £300,000 of the total thus obtained passed into the hands of the railway bureau, which at once undertook the building of a road from Kiōto to the shore of Lake Biwa, a work memorable as the first line built in Japan without foreign assistance.[1] During all this time private enterprise had remained wholly inactive in the matter of railways, and it became a matter of importance to rouse the people from this apathetic attitude. For the ordinary process of organizing a joint-stock company and raising share-capital the nation was not yet prepared. But shortly after the abolition of feudalism there had come into the possession of the former feudatories state loan-bonds amounting to some 18 millions sterling, which represented the sum granted by the treasury in commutation of the revenues formerly accruing to these men from their fiefs. Already events had shown that the feudatories, quite devoid of business experience, were not unlikely to dispose of these bonds and devote the proceeds to unsound enterprises. Prince Iwakura, one of the leaders of the Meiji statesmen, persuaded the feudatories to employ a part of the bonds as capital for railway construction, and thus the first private railway company was formed in Japan under the name Nippon tetsudo kaisha (Japan railway company), the treasury guaranteeing 8% on the paid-up capital for a period of 15 years. Some time elapsed before this example found followers, but ultimately a programme was elaborated and carried out having for its basis a grand trunk line extending the whole length of the main island from Aomori on the north to Shimonoseki on the south, a distance of 1153 m.; and a continuation of the same line throughout the length of the southern island of Kiūshiū, from Moji on the north—which lies on the opposite side of the strait from Shimonoseki—to Kagoshima on the south, a distance of 23234 m.; as well as a line from Moji to Nagasaki, a distance of 16312 m. Of this main road the state undertook to build the central section (376 m.), between Tōkyō and Kōbe (via Kiōto); the Japan railway company undertook the portion (457 m.) northward of Tōkyō to Aomori; the Sanyō railway company undertook the portion (320 m.) southward of Tōkyō to Shimonoseki; and the Kiūshiū railway company undertook the lines in Kiūshiū. The whole line is now in operation. The first project was to carry the Tōkyō-Kiōto line through the interior of the island so as to secure it against enterprises on the part of a maritime enemy. Such engineering difficulties presented themselves, however, that the coast route was ultimately chosen, and though the line through the interior was subsequently constructed, strategical considerations were not allowed completely to govern its direction.
When this building of railways began in Japan, much discussion was taking place in England and India as to the relative advantages of the wide and narrow gauges, and so strongly did the arguments in favour of the latter appeal to the English advisers of the Japanese government that the metre gauge was chosen. Some fitful efforts made in later years to change the system proved unsuccessful. The lines are single, for the most part; and as the embankments, the cuttings, the culverts and the bridge-piers have not been constructed for a double line, any change now would be very costly. The average speed of passenger trains in Japan is 18 m. an hour, the corresponding figure over the metre-gauge roads in India being 16 m., and the figure for English parliamentary trains from 19 to 28 m. British engineers surveyed the routes for the first lines and superintended the work of construction, but within a few years the Japanese were able to dispense with foreign aid altogether, both in building and operating their railways. They also construct carriages, wagons and locomotives, and they may therefore be said to have become entirely independent in the matter of railways, for a government iron-foundry at Wakamatsu in Kiūshiū is able to manufacture steel rails.
The total length of lines open for traffic at the end of March 1906 was 4746 m., 1470 m. having been built by the state and 3276 by private companies; the former at a cost of 16 millions sterling for construction and equipment, and the latter at a cost of 25 millions. Thus the expenditure by the state averaged £10,884 per mile, and that by private companies, £7631. This difference is explained by the facts that the state lines having been the pioneers, portions of them were built before experience had indicated cheap methods; that a very large and costly foreign staff was employed on these roads in the early days, whereas no such item appeared in the accounts of private lines; that extensive works for the building of locomotives and rolling stock are connected with the government’s roads, and that it fell to the lot of the state to undertake lines in districts presenting exceptional engineering difficulties, such districts being naturally avoided by private companies. The gross earnings of all the lines during the fiscal year 1905–1906 were 7 millions sterling, approximately, and the gross expenses (including the payment of interest on loans and debentures) were under 312 millions, so that there remained a net profit of 312 millions, being at the rate of a little over 812% on the invested capital. The facts that the outlays averaged less than 47% of the gross income, and that accidents and irregularities are not numerous, prove that Japanese management in this kind of enterprise is efficient.
When the fiscal year 1906–1907 opened, the number of private companies was no less than 36, owning and operating 3276 m. of railway. To say that this represented an average of 91 m. per company is to convey an over-favourable idea, for, as a matter of fact, 15 of the companies Nationalization of Private Railways. averaged less than 24 m. Anything like efficient co-operation was impossible in such circumstances, and constant complaints were heard about delays in transit and undue expense. The defects of divided ownership had long suggested the expediency of nationalization, but not until 1906 could the diet be induced to give its consent. On March 31 of that year, a railway nationalization law was promulgated. It enacted that, within a period of 10 years from 1906 to 1915, the state should purchase the 17 principal private roads, which had a length of 2812 m., and whose cost of construction and equipment had been 2312 millions sterling. The original scheme included 15 other railways, with an aggregate mileage of only 353 m.; but these were eliminated as being lines of local interest only. The actual purchase price of the 17 lines was calculated at 43 millions sterling (about double their cost price), on the following basis: (a) An amount equal to 20 times the sum obtained by multiplying the cost of construction at the date of purchase by the average ratio of the profit to the cost of construction during the six business terms of the company from the second half-year of 1902 to the first half-year of 1905. (b) The amount of the actual cost of stored articles converted according to current prices thereof into public loan-bonds at face value, except in the case of articles which had been purchased with borrowed money. The government agreed to hand over the purchase money within 5 years from the date of the acquisition of the lines, in public loan-bonds bearing 5% interest calculated at their face value; the bonds to be redeemed out of the net profits accruing from the purchased railways. It was calculated that this redemption would be effected in a period of 32 years, after which the annual profit accruing to the state from the lines would be 512 millions sterling. But the nationalization scheme, though apparently the only effective method of linking together and co-ordinating an excessively subdivided system of lines, has proved a source of considerable financial embarrassment. For when the state constituted itself virtually the sole owner of railways, it necessarily assumed responsibility for extending them so that they should suffice to meet the wants of a nation numbering some 50 millions. Such extension could be effected only by borrowing money. Now the government was pledged by the diet in 1907 to an expenditure of 1112 millions (spread over 8 years) for extending the old state system of roads, and an expenditure of 614 millions (spread over 12 years) for improving them. But from the beginning of that year, a
- ↑ In 1877 there were 120 English engineers, drivers and foremen in the service of the railway bureau. Three years later only three advisers remained.
