Science: For Streamlined Railroads

A simple cure for railroad collisions has been suggested by Orestes H. Caldwell, ex-Federal Radio Commissioner, now editor of Electronic Industries. His cure: two-way radio.

U.S. railroads have made almost no use of electronics. “Every ship and every plane,” says Caldwell, “is in constant touch with the rest of the world by radio — but every railroad train crew is utterly isolated while in motion.” To stop another train, trainmen still follow the “archaic practice” of sending a brakeman up the track with a lantern or flag.

But Caldwell observes that the recent epidemic of wrecks has begun to make railroads consider electronics. He thinks tomorrow’s roads will have:

> Radio telephones for constant train-to-train and train-to-dispatcher communication.

> Walkie-talkies for messages between freight locomotives, the caboose and brakemen patrolling the car tops.

> Electronic signaling and switching systems.

> Electric eyes for reading and recording freight-car numbers.

> Music and news broadcasts to brighten “dismal railroad waiting rooms.”