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PROCEEDINGS

The object of this Association is the advancement of knowledge pertaining to the scientific and economic location, construction, operation and maintenance

of railways. Its action is not binding upon its Members.

TUESDAY, MARCH 14, 1922

MORNING SESSION

The Twenty-third Annual Convention of the American Railway Engineering Association was called to order by the President, Mr. L. A. Downs, Vice-President and General Manager, Central of Georgia Railway, at 9:45 a. m.

The President:-Gentlemen, the Twenty-third convention of the American Railway Engineering Association is now in session ready for business. The members will please come to order.

The first order of business is the reading of the Minutes of the last meeting, but inasmuch as these are very voluminous, we will dispense with reading them, unless there is some objection.

ADDRESS OF PRESIDENT L. A. DOWNS

We are just about ready to pass the twenty-third milestone in the existence of the American Railway Engineering Association, and I am pleased and happy to advise you that we did not move backward during the past year. Our financial condition is good, notwithstanding the fact that nearly all other associations, clubs and organizations of like character during these bad times have had to make assessments and many of these organizations, notwithstanding these assessments, have had deficits, but I am pleased to advise you that we made all of our expenses and nearly $1,800 in addition, so that our financial affairs are in very good shape.

Our membership has increased. We received 129 new members into this Association during the past year. This is on top of the big drive for membership made in the previous year when there were nearly 600 new members admitted, and we think that the record for last year is very gratifying. The average increase of membership in the Association is 125 yearly, and to get 129 during the past year has put us certainly on the right track and shows what we are doing in the way of increased membership.

We

We now have a total of 1,960 members in the Association. dropped an unusually large number of members the past year, 115 on account of non-payment of dues, the largest number we have ever dropped, but the house was cleaned this year and we have now a good going organization.

There were 16 deaths during the past year among the members of our Association, one being Col. Webb, of the Board of Direction, and another, our first President, Mr. J. F. Wallace.

We have continued our affiliations with the American Railway Association in a very creditable manner, and I take pleasure in announcing to you that this convention is also a meeting of the Engineering Division of the American Railway Association, and our reports go to the American Railway Association for endorsement.

During the past year we have been admitted to membership in the American Engineering Standards Committee. This action has been approved by the American Railway Association and they have given authority to the Association to have Mr. Frink act as our representative on the American Engineering Standards Committee.

We have co-operated with other organizations during the past year, especially with the Joint Committee on Concrete and Reinforced Concrete, the American Society of Civil Engineers, and the American Society for Testing Materials, and others.

We have continued our contact, or rather tried to, with the universities. Dean Potter of Purdue University has invited the committee from this Association to visit Purdue. Two dates were set for a meeting of this committee, but through some unaccountable reason each date had to be postponed. It is hoped that this meeting will be held in the near future.

The Association has authorized the appointment of a committee to work out a means whereby a better contact with universities could be made. We are very mindful that such a thing is necessary. We have thought the matter over during the past year, it having been brought up in a part of the Presidential address of the last annual convention, that we should make this our duty to bring about these closer relations, but so far, I regret to say, nothing has been done. We expect, however, something constructive to be accomplished during this coming year and we hope that something will be done. We need the universities and the universities need us, and closer contact is necessary.

I sent a questionnaire to 19 universities a short time ago—19 representative technical schools of the United States-to which I received 15 replies. Out of these 15 replies there were 12 that gave definite information as to their graduates. During the past 10 years, from 1911 to 1921, there were 3,003 graduates in civil engineering, and, surprising as it may seem, only 272 or 9 per cent are working for railroads. I did not find out how many of the men in the engineering departments of the railroads were graduates of engineering schools, but in the case of two railroads, where I had a count made, that employed about 350 engineers, only about 50 per cent are graduates of technical schools. Therefore, something must be done to bring technical men into railroad work.

In the southeast, I made a canvass to discover what are the wages paid to the young engineering graduates who desire to enter railroad work in the Engineering Department, and I found that the average

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salary is $118 monthly. I am not in sympathy with the so-called welfare work of another engineering society in its uplifting of wages, but I want to say that if the managers of the railroads of the United States want the services of trained men they must fix some attractive wage for college graduates to start on. When we pay a fireman $175 a month to start, a flagman $141, a switchman $181, and a car repairer $143, and a graduate of a technical engineering school $118, there is something wrong with the principles of the wages paid on railroads. (Applause.)

The real test of the good work the Association is doing is whether our recommendations are being put into practice on the railways. The executive head of every railway having members in the Association or not, should put it up to the head of the Engineering Department as to whether the recommendations of the American Railway Engineering Association are being made use of in that Department, and if not, to give reasons for not doing so. The answers to that question will be constructive criticism, and our Association will know its destiny from such reports. I thank you.

(Applause.)

The next order of business is the reports of the Secretary and of the Treasurer.

Secretary E. H. Fritch presented the following reports of the Secretary and of the Treasurer:

REPORT OF THE SECRETARY

TO THE MEMBERS:

March 1, 1922

Report on the general affairs of the Association for the past year is respectfully submitted.

Finances

Exhibit A, appended hereto, gives a detailed record of the receipts and expenditures, from which the following items are abstracted:

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tion:

The following is a report on the present membership of the Associa

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Deceased Members

The losses sustained by death during the year were:

F. E. Bissell, Consulting Engineer

J. S. Browne, Assistant to Engineer Maintenance of Way, New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad

F. F. Busteed, ex-General Superintendent, Canadian Pacific Railway

H. C. Ferris, Receiver, Muskogee, Oklahoma and Gulf Railway

F. W. Leatherbury, Division Engineer, Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway

W. H. Given, Operating Department, Rock Island Lines

J. F. Keegan, General Superintendent, Baltimore and Ohio Railroad

G. C. Millet, Assistant to Chief Engineer, Atchison, Topeka and Santa
Fe Railway, Coast Lines

Major John W. Moore, Assistant Engineer, Illinois Central Railroad
R. J. Parker, General Manager, Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway
Western Lines

R. M. Pearce, Resident Engineer, Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad

C. W. Pifer, Office Engineer, U. S. Railroad Administration

J. R. Savage, General Superintendent, Long Island Railroad

Colonel George D. Snyder, Consulting Engineer

John Findley Wallace (Past-President), Chairman, Chicago Railway. Terminal Commission

Colonel George H. Webb (Director), Chief Engineer, Michigan Central Railroad.

Committee Reports

The results of the labors of the Standing and Special Committees during the year are embodied in the printed reports presented to you for consideration at this meeting.

The committees have rendered the Association and to the railways a valuable service, and are to be commended for their good work.

Revised Manual

Further time is requested in which to complete work on the revised Manual. Five hundred pages of the volume are already printed. It is now expected to have the Manual ready for distribution about July 1st.

Approval of Recommendations by

American Railway Association

The recommendations adopted at the March, 1921, annual meeting of the American Railway Engineering Association—functioning also as the Engineering Division of the American Railway Association-were presented to the November, 1921, session of the latter organization for endorsement.

The subjects receiving such endorsement by the American Railway Association are as follows:

(a) Subsidence and shrinkage of embankments;

(b) Drainage of large cuts;

(c) Instructions to govern ballasting on an operated line;

(d) Specifications for stone ballast material;

(e) Specifications for washed gravel;

(f) Standard ballast tools;

(g) Specifications for cross-ties and for switch-ties;

(h) Rail record forms;

(i) Specifications for switches, frogs, crossings and guard-rails;

(j) Specifications, classification and grading rules for lumber and timber used in the Maintenance of Way Department;

(k) Roadway information signs;

(1) Manual of instructions for the guidance of engineering field parties; (m) Manual of instructions for the guidance of employecs of the Maintenance of Way Department;

(n) Science of organization;

(0) Specifications and plans for railway water tanks;

(p) Methods of economic transfer of lading of bad-order cars by mechanical means or otherwise;

(q) Rules and unit stresses for rating existing bridges;

(r) Principles and detailed design of flashing, drainage, reinforcement and protection of railroad bridges for waterproofing purposes;

(s) Form of lease agreement for industrial site.

Standardization

The American Railway Association has taken out membership in American Engineering Standards Committee, and designated a member of the Engineering Division to be its official representative on that body. Mr. E. A. Frink, Chairman of the Standardization Committee of your Association, has been appointed to act in that capacity, with Mr. J. R. W. Ambrose as alternate.

Among the matters now pending before the A. E. S. C., with the view of standardization, in which your Association is concerned, are the following:

Railroad Cross-Ties and Switch-Ties

Pipe Flanges and Fittings

Steel Railway Bridge Specifications

Grading of Lumber

Testing of Wood

Steel Forgings

Bolt, Nut, and Rivet Proportions

Steel Shapes

Insulated Wires and Cables

Overhead Crossing Specifications

Electrical Symbols

Electrical Power Control

Aluminum for Conducting Purposes.

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