Railway time

[Railway time]

I've often read that railway time was introduced in the UK and the US because of a number of accidents caused by non-standard time. However, I've never found any description of an accident which specifically makes reference to a disparity in local times causing an accident.
Please, if you know of any such accidents, post the link to where I can find out details which confirm this.
Thanks,

 

[edwin_m]

Welcome to the forum. By the way, it's not a good idea to start the same topic in two different areas, as the discussion gets split all over the place. I've asked the mods to remove the other one - I'm sure they won't mind.

I'm not sure how discrepancies in time can cause an accident under ither British or American operating practices. In the UK there used to be something called a time interval system in the early years of railways, when a train wouldn't leave a station until say 15min after the previous one. But that was only relying on the time in one place, if the clock had stopped it would have been "failsafe" and it led to so many accidents it was abandoned within a few decades.

The Americans traditionally had a system of "timetable and train order" where the timetable dictated the normal sequence of trains. However even here I think there were safeguards against time differences, so if the timetable said "train X to wait for train Y at Z" train X had to wait until train Y turned up or they received a message that the arrangements had been changed. So again it doesn't rely on time being consistent. Someone with more knowledge may be able to support or contradict me on this...

I've read that the railways were instrumental in standardising time. Traditionally each town in the UK would set its local time by the sun so it varied by a few minutes east to west. But that clearly wouldn't work for the railway when train crews carried watches from place to place, so the railway standardised the time across its network. Not surprisingly this was confusing to all the locals so the towns all fell in line. This was to London time in the UK, and I guess something similar in the States although the country is big enough that several time zones were necessary (although I think the Russian railways ran on Moscow time right across their huge network).

 

[etr221]

The American T&TO system did - in part - rely on trains observing timed instructions - either from the timetable or in orders - so accurate and consistent knowledge of time was essential. Conductors and engineers (drivers) were all required to have an approved 'railroad' watch for this.

While I don't know the details, the railroads were a - if not the - driving force behind the adoption of standard time zones, with an hour between them, across America, at the end of the nineteenth century.

Two points I would make is that is that railways were about the first non-military activity to require time synchronised activities in different locations; and secondly, they were rapidly followed by the electric telegraph, which also benefited from time standardisation - and enabled it. It is perhaps noteworthy that when, in about 1920, there was thought of adopting the 24 hour clock. the two industries to be consulted were the railways and the Post Office - a measure of perhaps - in a pre-broadcasting age - how unimportant accurate and precise times were for most people, in everyday use.

 

[Railway time]

Welcome to the forum. By the way, it's not a good idea to start the same topic in two different areas, as the discussion gets split all over the place. I've asked the mods to remove the other one - I'm sure they won't mind.

Thanks, I didn't spot this forum until after I posted in the other, so I wasn't sure, but thanks for sorting it out for me.

 

[krus_aragon]

I'm not familiar with accidents in the UK because of a lack of railway time, but there are plenty of anecdotes of passengers missing trains because they were confused between railway time and local time. The Great Western Railway was the first British railway to have to deal with this issue: they used London time, and clocks at Bristol and Exeter had extra minute hands to show local and railway time, see here. (The London & Birmingham and successor LNWR ran mainly north-south, whereas the GWR crossed many lines of lattitude as it ran east-west.)

I can't recall any instance of (pre-telegraph) time-interval working causing an accident because of the use of local time: the more common cause of accident was that the train in front would be delayed for some other reason, and would still be in the way when the second train came thundering through ten minutes later.

Further reading on this matter would be L.T.C. Rolt's Red for Danger (a fine history of british railway disasters, and the safety systems introduced to avoid them) and on the Railway Archive website.

 

[gilbert123]

hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working. things didn't improve much until time interval working was replaced by block working .

 

[Y Ddraig Coch]

hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working. things didn't improve much until time interval working was replaced by block working .

Any examples , links to articles or history books for us to see or read about some of these hundreds?

 

[edwin_m]

hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working. things didn't improve much until time interval working was replaced by block working .

But as I explained above, time interval working doesn't rely on the correct time being known at both ends of the section. As long as the person dispatching the trains in a particular direction from a particular place always uses the same clock and doesn't adjust it, safety is not degraded (or rather the very low degree of safety isn't actually made any worse).

Into the era of Absolute Block working, accident reports often note that where more than one signal box was involved the Inspector would have checked their clocks and would often report discrepancies of a minute or two. Again this isn't inherently dangerous and is the result of the clocks being inaccurate or incorrectly set rather than any intentional difference in time zone. The purpose of the check is so the Inspector can adjust the times shown in the register books to establish a common timeline for the events happening at different boxes.

 

[pdeaves]

hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working. things didn't improve much until time interval working was replaced by block working .

edwin_m is right. There are two issues here; 'time interval working' (where the next train runs in 15 minutes' time, doesn't matter if the clock says 05:13 or 12:45 or anything else) and 'local time' (essentially how high the sun is in the sky). The former is known to be a cause of accidents, the latter isn't (unless someone can point to evidence to the contrary).

 

[Railway time]

hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working. things didn't improve much until time interval working was replaced by block working .

This is the dogma, but I've yet to find a single example online. If you know of one, or a book which contains on please share.

 

[Railway time]

But as I explained above, time interval working doesn't rely on the correct time being known at both ends of the section. As long as the person dispatching the trains in a particular direction from a particular place always uses the same clock and doesn't adjust it, safety is not degraded (or rather the very low degree of safety isn't actually made any worse).

Into the era of Absolute Block working, accident reports often note that where more than one signal box was involved the Inspector would have checked their clocks and would often report discrepancies of a minute or two. Again this isn't inherently dangerous and is the result of the clocks being inaccurate or incorrectly set rather than any intentional difference in time zone. The purpose of the check is so the Inspector can adjust the times shown in the register books to establish a common timeline for the events happening at different boxes.

Thanks, this is very useful to know. I suppose there are events when the running of the trains don't just depend on a single dispatcher with a Master Clock though. Several of the examples I've read about involve trains running behind schedule or not going into the correct siding on a single track. In particular, this example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1853_Providence_and_Worcester_head-on_collision seems to rest on the times on the conductors had on their malfunctioning watches (as explained here), but not that there was a problem due to local times specifically.

Any examples that can be linked to timing problems caused by malfunctioning watches much appreciated.

 

[30907]

In the UK (says Wikipedia) Railway Time was adopted in the early 1840s, before there were any significant lengths of single line railway, so the US example you quote is unlikely to have been replicated here. Not sure about mainland Europe though.

 

[John Webb]

L T C Rolt's book "Red for Danger" mentions that while there were clocks at stations that ran on local time there were accidents, although some of these were due to the clocks themselves not keeping time very well, which even further interfered with the 'Time Interval' method of separating trains! It was Captain Melhuish, a Board of Trade inspector, who in his report of 1840, suggested that station clocks should be kept on 'London Time'. By 1852 virtually all railways used "Greenwich Time", facilitated by daily time signals distributed by the railways' telegraph systems. This affected the towns and cities through which the railways ran, who in turn adopted "Greenwich" or "London" time; but in popular parlance it was referred to as "Railway Time".

 

[gilbert123]

Any examples , links to articles or history books for us to see or read about some of these hundreds?

would you like them in date or alphabetical order ?

 

[pdeaves]

would you like them in date or alphabetical order ?

Either!

 

[gilbert123]

just read Railway Inspectorate Accident reports starting about 1850 .you'll enjoy it

 

[PeterC]

This is the dogma, but I've yet to find a single example online. If you know of one, or a book which contains on please share.

Remember that the post you responded to combined incidents due to railway time and to time interval working.
Time interval working contributed to the Armargh disaster. The Wikipedia list of railway accidents includes a lot of rear end collisions in the 1850s which I would infer are down to time interval working.

 

[Taunton]

the States although the country is big enough that several time zones were necessary (although I think the Russian railways ran on Moscow time right across their huge network).

Correct, the Soviet (making the distinction from Russian) railways ran on Moscow Time, generally known as such among the general population, as did a number of other organisations like the airline Aeroflot and even television programmes, which led to strange looking rail timetables such as commuter routes having a burst of activity at 0300.

The USA had the additional issue that when summer time came along, it was not universal, some places did and some didn't (which still applies to an extent), and some rail timetables used local time and others Standard Time, so were an hour out for half the year. Such railways gave official watches to crews, who had to keep them on Standard Time. Public timetables printed in Standard Time must have given rise to various passenger misunderstandings, which I am sure could not be wholly prevented with crews either.

 

[gilbert123]

time interval working was not totally banned until 1889. it was still possible - and did happen in times of emergency - subsequent to this .

before Railway Time came into being ,it was often the case that the "time" varied from station to station ,let alone town to town .

when the telegraph became universal , a time signal would be sent down the wires for all signalmen (bobbies) to set their clock accurately . even then , some clocks were known to "go wildly"

 

[gilbert123]

a couple of notable accidents - to me at least , due to time interval working ,are , one , the horrible crash in the Clayton tunnel , on the LBSCR , and one around 1875 from memory , at Harrow , which had some parallels with the 1952 disaster .
there was another in Kilsby tunnel from memory where the fire burnt for days , roasting the cattle who were the unfortunate passengers . accurate details can be found in "Red for Danger", and also in the Railway Inspectorate archives

Holts book is essential reading , but the real meat is in the Inspectorate achives

 

[edwin_m]

a couple of notable accidents - to me at least , due to time interval working ,are , one , the horrible crash in the Clayton tunnel , on the LBSCR , and one around 1875 from memory , at Harrow , which had some parallels with the 1952 disaster .
there was another in Kilsby tunnel from memory where the fire burnt for days , roasting the cattle who were the unfortunate passengers . accurate details can be found in "Red for Danger", and also in the Railway Inspectorate archives

Holts book is essential reading , but the real meat is in the Inspectorate achives

The Clayton Tunnel accident was ironically on one of the first sections of the route to have a primitive form of space-interval (block) signalling, a signal at the approach and a telegraph link to the man at the other end who would advise when a train had passed through. The time interval system was a contributory factor in that it led to three trains approaching in very quick succession, but the accident was a result of confusion and an imperfect system to replace the signal automatically.

For anyone that doesn't know, there are hundreds of accident reports at railwaysarchive.co.uk including many from the Victorian period.

 

[etr221]

Time interval working was still the 'default' on BR in the event of communication failure well into the 1970s and beyond, and was involved in the accident at Worcester Tunnel Junction on 3rd January 1976, see http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/eventsummary.php?eventID=1491 .
Can anybody say when (or indeed if) it was finally abolished?

 

[etr221]

The USA had the additional issue that when summer time came along, it was not universal, some places did and some didn't (which still applies to an extent), and some rail timetables used local time and others Standard Time, so were an hour out for half the year. Such railways gave official watches to crews, who had to keep them on Standard Time. Public timetables printed in Standard Time must have given rise to various passenger misunderstandings, which I am sure could not be wholly prevented with crews either.

The Chicago, South Shore and South Bend RR passenger timetable always specified that timings were on 'Chicago Time', despite most of the line being in Indiana - a state which isn't all in the same time zone, and not all of which observes daylight savings (summer) time.

Because times were (and are) part of the American safe working system, clarity in applicable time zone was essential on the railway, and strictly laid down - even if 'civilian' (passenger) watches didn't agree.

IIRC the railway boundary for time zones didn't always match the 'civil' one, being aligned to operating division limits (where crews, etc. changed)

 

[edwin_m]

The Chicago, South Shore and South Bend RR passenger timetable always specified that timings were on 'Chicago Time', despite most of the line being in Indiana - a state which isn't all in the same time zone, and not all of which observes daylight savings (summer) time.

Because times were (and are) part of the American safe working system, clarity in applicable time zone was essential on the railway, and strictly laid down - even if 'civilian' (passenger) watches didn't agree.

IIRC the railway boundary for time zones didn't always match the 'civil' one, being aligned to operating division limits (where crews, etc. changed)

https://www.timeanddate.com/time/us/indiana-time.html
The above link suggests that Indiana has adopted daylight saving since 2006, and the parts closest to Chicago are also on Central Time. When I travelled Amtrak in 1990 parts of Indiana along with Arizona didn't observe daylight saving, and they took the opportunity to issue a new timetable with any incidental changes taking effect from the date of the clock change. The overnight trains would hang around for an hour at the autumn change and run an hour late for the rest of their journeys after the spring change, which from what I hear of Amtrak's punctuality these days probably isn't noticeable.

 

[etr221]

https://www.timeanddate.com/time/us/indiana-time.html
The above link suggests that Indiana has adopted daylight saving since 2006, and the parts closest to Chicago are also on Central Time. When I travelled Amtrak in 1990 parts of Indiana along with Arizona didn't observe daylight saving, and they took the opportunity to issue a new timetable with any incidental changes taking effect from the date of the clock change. The overnight trains would hang around for an hour at the autumn change and run an hour late for the rest of their journeys after the spring change, which from what I hear of Amtrak's punctuality these days probably isn't noticeable.

A change since my time out there...

 

[Railway time]

just read Railway Inspectorate Accident reports starting about 1850 .you'll enjoy it

Mate, this is not hugely helpful. If you know of an example in which local time caused an acciddent then please post a link. Back up your claims with some evidence.

 

[Railway time]

Remember that the post you responded to combined incidents due to railway time and to time interval working.
Time interval working contributed to the Armargh disaster. The Wikipedia list of railway accidents includes a lot of rear end collisions in the 1850s which I would infer are down to time interval working.

The original question is about local time, not interval working.
If there are accidents which are cuased by a combination of local time and interval woring this would be interesting. THanks for your suggestions.

 

[Railway time]

edwin_m is right. There are two issues here; 'time interval working' (where the next train runs in 15 minutes' time, doesn't matter if the clock says 05:13 or 12:45 or anything else) and 'local time' (essentially how high the sun is in the sky). The former is known to be a cause of accidents, the latter isn't (unless someone can point to evidence to the contrary).

Exactly the point. time interval working is one thing, local time (i.e. time being recorded differently at different stations) is another. Specifically I am interested in accidents which occur due to the latter, although there don't seem to any. That's a fine answer if that's the case.

 

[gilbert123]

my name is not "mate"
accidents are rarely a result of a single cause . it usually takes a number of errors by one or more people to defeat the systems in place .
while I cannot find an example directly attributable to local time it is easy to see that it could have a bearing on time interval working, so the important factor is time.
mind you , I have not spent much time looking as I don't intend doing your research for you .
what efforts have you done on your own account ?

 

[krus_aragon]

my name is not "mate"
accidents are rarely a result of a single cause . it usually takes a number of errors by one or more people to defeat the systems in place .
while I cannot find an example directly attributable to local time it is easy to see that it could have a bearing on time interval working, so the important factor is time.
mind you , I have not spent much time looking as I don't intend doing your research for you .
what efforts have you done on your own account ?

For my part, the only active efforts I've made is to have a think about the topic, consulted the index of my well-thumbed copy of Red for Danger, re-read the first chapters (skim-reading), write a post anwering the OP on Friday, and read subsequent posts. That's not because of any personal stake in the matter: I just thought "that's an interesting question, and I'd like to know the answer too".

Your statement that there were "hundreds - literally of accidents were caused by local time / time interval working" interests me, as it differs from my experience and that of other posters. I wondered if you might be conflating the two things, as did others.

The OP stated in their first post:

I've never found any description of an accident which specifically makes reference to a disparity in local times causing an accident.
Please, if you know of any such accidents, post the link to where I can find out details which confirm this.

If you haven't "spent much time looking" as you "don't intend doing [our] research for [us]", that's fine, you don't have to. But posting to a thread that asks for examples, and saying that examples exist but you won't look for them or direct us to them isn't very helpful.