Show worlds most curious road china may rightly lay claim to line that la unique among eartha railroads the most curious railroad in the world ta in china and it was built and financed solely by chinese it la also operated by it Is known as the sunning railway and its terminus Is at kung alk port miles southwest of canton at present there are 32 miles in operation era tion and there are four miles un der construction and four miles more proposed making a total of 40 miles when the whole enterprise Is finished the idea of building this railroad originated with ir chin gee hee who was then in the united states and borne subscriptions for stock were secured from other chinese residents of the united states the majority of the stock however Is now owned by residents of the province of kwang tung when the road was surveyed the villagers were very much opposed to it and refused to sell land to the corn pany to be used for railroad purposes but after meeting all these obstructions for a considerable time with great patience the projectors finally obtained their consent to and co opera tion in ita construction the line Is being constructed entirely by non scientific chinese no per son of any nationality other than chinese has ever been connected in any way with the building of this road it Is being built under the direction of mr chin president of the railway who returned to china from the unit ed after 40 years experience there some of which was as a railroad foreman and contractor he has no engineering or railroad knowledge other than the experience gained while in the united states he has the help of about fore men and laborers who came back from the untied states all with moro or less experience in railroad construction the construction work commenced in the middle of 1906 and part of the line was opened to traffic at the begin nang of 1908 the whole road Is provided with telephone lines for dispatching trains run three trips a day from each end taking about two hours for the trip the average dally receipts are from to on passenger traffic and from 10 to 50 on freight with a daily expense of about the capital of the railway Is 1350 divided into shares of 2 50 each all of which are owned by chinese and pay good dividends to the ers there are two loops one at kung yik and one at sunning there are no turnstiles turn stiles at present but these will be put in at kung sunning chung lau and au shan the bead office Is in sunning alty 17 miles from kung alk port where a printing office Is established for printing the timetables and advertising matter tor the road at kung there are an office a storeroom a machine shop a black smith shop a foundry there are no overhead bridges or tunnels on the line the road Is sand gravel and earth ballested ballasted bal lasted standard gauge and single track with a side track at every station |