A correspondent writes:—In September, 1896, the Dover Corporation opened their system of electric tramways, and the first year's working after paying interest on, and returning a first instalment of, the loan has resulted in a profit of £1,300. A total of 1,794,903 persons were carried at a uni: form rate of one penny. The system is that of the overhead trolley car supplied and erected by Dick Kerr & Ca., London. This is the system now generally used in England, and it is very successfully working in the following French towns; Havre, Nice, Tours, Chalons-sur-Marne, and many other places in different parts of the Continent. At Paris a new electric tramway has just been inaugurated from the Bastille Charenton, a distance of a little over four English miles. Most of the way it is worked by the overhead trolley car system, Thomson Houston patents. But in places where the road is narrow or at big crossings, and also where it passes monuments and public buildings where it would be perhaps not safe or unsightly, the underground conduit system has been adopted, for total distance of half a mile. The cars will carry 36 passengers, they are large and comfortable, and are lit with the electric light. The fare is 10 centimes or about one penny, and the time between the two termini, including stoppages, is 27 minutes, There is a slight delay at the places where the systems change.
Parisian papers are ridiculing the idea of introducing the conduit system in this undertaking. They insist that there cannot be any objection to the trolley car system if it is only carried out properly as it ison this line. The wires are carried on elegant iron posts fin the centre of the road alight and graceful design. Comparisons are drawn between these handsome castings, and the newspaper kiosks, conveniences and shelters found in the streets everywhere. The trolley car system is certainly gaining ground; it is rather more unsightly and a little less safe than its rival the conduit system, but the Intter has generally been found' to cost double both in its installation and maintenance.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.