June 7, 1909.]
THE PEAK TRAMWAY'S 21ST
ANNIVERSARY.
A GLANCE AT ITS EARLY HISTORY
in
To-morrow is the twenty-first anniversary of the opening of the Peak Tramway, and it occurs to us that an outline of its history many prove very interesting reading at a time when an additional line to the Peak is under the con- sideration of the Government Both schemes owed their inception to Mr. Findlay Smith.
The building of the Peak tramway takes us back to a time when there were very few houses on the Peak. As Hongkong grew the need of suburban advantages for the European popula- tion forced itself increasingly on the public attention. Every resident at some time or other had made an excursion to enjoy the cool, fresh breezes of the mountain tops. and the advantage of residence there an atmosphere from eight to ten degrees cooler than in the town below, was recognised, but the cost in time and money of getting up and down precluded the possibility of any considerable development of the Peak as a residential quarter. When Mr. Findlay Smith put forward the idea of a mountain railway the public looked askance at the scheme. While admitting the utility and importance of such a line they doubted its practicability, and when assurances
were forthcoming on this point, they still had no confidence in the enterprise ever paying its shareholders a fair return on their investment. But Mr. Findlay Smith was not discouraged. Mountain railways existed at the time in Europe and America
and he was quite satisfied in his own mind that mountain railway was a praticability in Hongkong. Nor was he less confident that the line would pay. In the early Eighties he calculated that with no more than from thirty to forty families living at the Peak, the annual expenditure of residents and visitors in reaching the top amounted to figures approaching $45.000. And taking into account the highly probable augmentation of traffic, which is the invariable experience of railways running to fashionable or popular resorts, the projector felt confident of the success of his scheme. Mr. Findlay Smith had been travelling on several separate occasions in America, as well as part of two winters in Europe, and had taken advantage of these occasions to visit and make himself conversaut with nearly every method of railway then employed in mountain ascent. From the original Clay Street and subsequent schemes in San Francisco to the two or three methods in Scarborough and so on to the Rigi, Monterey, Lucerne, the Rhine and Mount Vesuvius, Mr. Findlay Smith made a thorough inspection, and returned to this Colony thoroughly convinced that the enterprise would succeed in Hongkong. The project was put in shape by presenting to H. E. the Governor of the Colony the following Petition dated 20th May 1881-
IR JOHN POPE HENNESSY, K.C.M.G.
Governor of Hongkong, &c, &c, &c, In Council. The Petition of
ALEXANDER FINDLAY SMITH, of Victoria, Hongkong, (formerly of the Highland Railway Company, Scotland). Humbly Sheweth :--
1. That the growing prosperity and increa- sing p pulation of Hongkong render the introduction of improved means of locomotion within the island a matter of urgent social and commercial importance.
CHINA, OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
Aberdeen.
4.-The advantages, especially to the business life of the Colony, of a line of tramway on Queen's Road, need no demonstration. As to scheme B, your petitioner respectfully submits that, if carried out, it would
469
A. From a terminus to be fixed at East | had been laboriously working at for a long time Point, via Queen's Road, to a terminus previous, and that the terms submitted were to be fixed at West Point.
somewhat too vague and indefinite to warrant B.-Along a route, to be determined by them either in withdrawing from their own special surveys, from Queen's Road, in special undertaking or merging it into that of the vicinity of the Parade Ground, to the new Company. But on the 16th July of the Victoria Gap, and thence to a point ou same year a Rovised Proposal was drawn out the southern slope, in the neighbourhood and submitted to Messrs. Ryrie and Findlay Smith, to which those two gentlemen finally attached their signatures, and by which they consented to amalgamate their tramway scheme with that of the rival concern. On the 20th of the same month Messrs. Ryrie and Findlay Smith, who appear, in a measure, to have been reluctantly forced to compliance by a stronger body of workers, or supposed workers, not a little astonished to receive. communication from Mr. Alford, informing them, with regret, that the general body of his promoters had not been able to see their way to ratify the instrument of amalgamation, and thus they were again left to themselves to carry out their own Tramway to the Peak undisturbed and unfettered by jealous rivals or other 'syndicates, although by an arrangement under which power for both the Low Level Tramway scheme, of which Mr. was Secretary, and the High Level Tramway should be obtained under one Bill, and their part (Messrs. Ryrie and Findlay Smith's) assigned to them by deed, which was afterwards accomplished."
Firstly, Render valuable Crown Lands
now unproductive. Secondly-Afford important facilities for the moving of troops and material, as well as ready means of access to the Military Sanitarium now about to be constructed. In this connection may be suggested the not altogether conjectural contingency that, with a regular tram- way service to the Peak, it might become advisable, for economical and sanitary rea- sons, to barrack the greater portion of the Garrison on the higher grounds, in which event the Government would reap con- siderable benefit from the diversion to commercial uses of the extensive
pro- perty now occupied by the military. Thirdly. Open up the coolest and most attractive parts of the island to residents and visitors. Fourthly,Add largely and beneficially to the over-crowded residential area of the Colony.
with
Fifthly, Establish communication
the outport of Aberdeen, and villages on the southern side. 5.-In the alternative, your petitioner prays that authorization may be conferred on him to carry out either of the schemes above indicated. to make surveys under observation of the Surveyor-General's Department, and to perform all other acts essential to the promotion of the undertaking. And also that, if accorded, the concession for scheme B may be accompanied by a grant of the Crown Land required for the track, for sidings. and for buildings at different points, together with such privileges and easements as Your Excel- lency shall deem reasonable and requisite. The fact that proposal B. while indisputably a scheme of great public utility, is attended with exceptional engineering difficulty, and is ons regarding which favourable financial results cannot be predicated with certainty, must be your petitioner's apology for bespeaking every consideration in the terms of the concession prayed for.
To this petition an answer was received from the Governor, through the Colonial Secretary. informing the petitioner that by going through the necessary forms of procedure there would be nothing to stop him from obtaining leave to carry out his ideas, provided he could get some member of the Legislative Council to take charge of the requisite bill. What followed is set forth in the following newspaper extract:— "No sooner, however, had the question been mooted in the Council, and of course in the public papers, than suddenly a rival company sprang into existence, or perhaps it might more properly be said that certain gentlemen in the colony proposed to form themselves into a syndicate to control everything of this kind which appeared to them to have money in it. In June of that year our projector was not a little astonished to receive a letter from Mr. R. J. Alford, who signed himself the Secretary of the Hongkong. and China Tramway Company, containing a proposal for 'amalgama tion, and also to make his pet scheme, the tramway to the Peak, a kind of branch of the дет Company's larger undertaking. It was about this time that the Hon. P. Ryrie appears to have joined hands with Mr. 4. Findlay Smith, and the third item in the rival proposition was that these gentlemen 3.-Your petitioner respectfully approaches should become co-promoters of the Hongkong Your Excellency in ouncil, praying that your and China Tramway Company.' with seats on Excellency may be pleased to grant him a the Board. These proposals did not appear to concession investing him with powers to con- meet with a every hearty reception from struct and work, by means of a public company, Messrs. Ryrie and Findlay Smith, who in- or as a private enterprise, a wire-rope railroad. formed the rival Company that the proposals of a gauge of about 3 feet 6 inches, between the I submitted merely indicated an intention to following points
promote the very same object which the latter
2.That public requirements in this respect would be most effectually served by the con. struction of lines of tramway; and that, having regard to the configuration of the island, the nature of its climate, and sanitary and economic considerations, the wire-rope system of the great American railroads presents indubitable advant-
ages.
were
another
Alford
The New Tramway Bill agreed upon by the amalgamated companies, was published in the Government Gazette of July 2nd 1881, and embraced five schemes for Low Level Tramways and one for the Peak Tramway which reads as follows:-
A partly single and partly double line com- boundary of the War Department ground at its mencing on the South side of the South-West junction with the Garden Road, thence passing in a southerly direction up the hillside to the Plantation Roads by means of bridges, and Victoria Gap, crossing over Kennedy and terminating at the Victoria Gap at a point on the North side of Farm Lot No. 53."
The Bill was in due course passed by the Legislative Council.
low-level scheme.
A company was started to carry out the The capital was to be half a million dollars, and the Provisional Committee, included at least half a dozen of the best names in Hongkong. The Hon. Mr W. Keswick was the Chairman and his colleagues on the Com- mittee were the Hon. T. Jackson, the Hon. F. D. Sussoon, Messrs. C. P. Chater, W. Danby, W. H. Forbes, W. K. Hughes, A. B. Johnson, J. A. Moseley und W. Wootten. The ommittes, however, found the general public apathetic, and the capital was not subscribed within the time allowed by the ordinance to elapse before the commencement of the work. An extension of time was applied for and granted. Renewed efforts to raise the capital were, however, unavailing, and it remained for a London syndicate to construct the low-level tramway some twenty years later. →
But the high-level scheine escaped that fate. The privileges belonging to this scheme were assigned by the promoters of the Tramways Ordinance of 1883 (Messrs. F. B. Johnson, T. Jackson, W. K. Hughes and Ng Choy) to the Hon. Mr. Phineas Ryrie and Mr. A. Findlay Smith, and Government consenting to this assignment granted the assignees an extension of twelve months for the substantial.commence- ment of the construction of the line. In dua course a company was formed with a capital of $125,00 in 1,250 shares of $100 each, the Consulting Committee consisting of the Hon. Mr. Phineas Ryrie, Messrs. A. Molver, J. B. Coughtrie and A. Findlay Smith, and the General Managers, Messrs. McEwen, Frickel and Co. The shares were subscribed and a survey was at once made by Mr. J. F. Boulton, M.I.C.E., and the actual work of con- struction was begun on the 20th September, 1885 Mr. Boulton acted as resident on- gineer until failing health compelled him to leave the Colony for a time. The line was completed from St. John's Place to Victoria Gap, a length of 4,690 feet, in the beginning of 1888. The height of the upper above the lower terminus is 1,27 feet. The easiest gradient is 1 in 25 and the steepest 1 in 2.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.