Victoria--both of the stations that rest side by side and share the name in common--seemingly is no larger than the Broad Street or Market Street Station in Philadelphia. The combined station certainly is not as large as Broad Street, barely larger than Market Street. Yet in each business day more trains arrive and depart from its train-sheds than either at Broad Street or at Market Street. How is this done? In the beginning the British railway man does not feel that when he builds a railway terminal he has to provide a great congregation place for the people. There is of course at great interchange points in the heart of this country--such as Kansas City or Atlanta or Cincinnati or Omaha or St. Paul--a real need for abundant waiting-room capacity where through travelers may be properly housed between their trains--for a number of hours, if need be. At more strictly terminal or near-terminal points such as Philadelphia or New York or Boston this necessity largely disappears, and the space that is taken by huge waiting-rooms can better be used by more essential station facilities. Victoria Station does not exceed ten platform-tracks in width. To handle more than 300 trains a day within this limited capacity means the very highest efficiency in train handling. Not only does it mean the maximum of promptitude in loading and unloading the trains but an adaptation of their schedules wherever possible so that an incoming train bringing passengers into the station is used for a regular run taking other passengers out again, and so the necessity of an "empty movement" into the storage-yards and back again is avoided. Moreover the very arrangement of the tracks and platforms themselves leads to efficiency in these things. When but a few years ago it became necessary to enlarge radically the capacity of the side of Victoria Station belonging to the London, Brighton, and South Coast railway the engineers found that they would have to think twice before they accomplished their purpose. The station was but six tracks in width, divided into two groups of three tracks each--two of these alongside the platforms, with a middle one reserved for the switching of the locomotives backwards and forwards. It was not possible to increase this limited width. Upon the one side stood an important through street of London--Buckingham Palace Road--and upon the other the equally immovable twin-station of the Southeastern and Chatham railway. Therefore the engineers did the one thing possible, short of the enormously expensive job of double-decking the station--they lengthened it, and at a comparatively low cost doubled its capacity.