The system of compulsory labour was abolished under the Highways Act of 1835. Then “just as the highways were really improving they were overwhelmed by the ‘calamity of the railways.’ The coaches that had paid such a large proportion of the tolls were taken off the roads ; the turnpikes became bankrupt and the Government was obliged to abandon the policy of laissez-faire and do something for road maintenance. The turnpike trusts were gradually wound up . . . In 1888 the care of the main roads was transferred to the County Councils, the others being given over to the Rural or Urban District Councils.” (pp. 238-9).

Mrs. Knowles draws attention to the different course taken by road development in France where for reasons of State and for the speedy movement of troops roads were early under the care of the central government.

>From roads let us turn to railways. Here again England and the Continental countries followed divergent courses. In England the railways were built to cater for existing traffic, and accumulations of capital were there ready to find scope for investment. The State, therefore, did not need to give financial assistance to start the railways and had no military motives for doing so. On the Continent capital was scarce, the traffic did not already exist in profitable quantities, and the State had to intervene both to provide the necessary capital and because of military needs. The continental railways were largely planned for strategic reasons. Such lines as those in Prussia leading to the Russian frontier would not have been built if commercial reasons alone had dominated.

It is interesting to notice that the United States, in later years held up as the outstanding example of an “individualist” country abhorring State interference, was early in the field with Government subsidies to develop the railways. “The United States, which followed English tradition so closely in its turnpikes, did not follow it in its railways at first. Improved transport was so vitally necessary to a new country that the State Governments subsidised and encouraged many railways between 1830 and 1838, raising the money by loans. No less than 42,871,084 dollars were spent by the States on railways before 1838. A great financial collapse followed in 1837 ; some States repudiated their debts and sold their railways, and the new State constitutions nearly all inserted a prohibition on the use of State funds for internal improvements. After that they adopted the English method of allowing private individuals to finance the railways. The peculiarity of the railways of the United States lay in the fact that they were built in advance of existing traffic in order to open up the country.” (Knowles, p. 254).