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112
value, and resell at its improved value, all property which will
front upon the widened thoroughfare, so that whatever may
be the merits of the principle of "betterment" and its
natural corollary of compensation in the abstract, whether
as a means to lessen the cost of the improvement to the
ratepayers, or to more equitably adjust the burden between
persons deriving a benelit and those sustaining a loss by the
improvement, the County Council would seem to derive the
whole of the "betterment" in the present instance, by purchasing
and reselling the property under altered conditions.
PARLIAMENTARY SCHEMES, SESSION 1889.
The clauses which the promoters proposed to insert in the
Central London (Subway) Railway Bill, to meet the objections
of the Vestry, not proving satisfactory, the Vestry
continued their opposition to the scheme. The Committee
of the House of Commons, to whom the Bill was referred,
reported that the preamble was not proved to their satisfaction,
and the Bill was therefore rejected.
PARLIAMENTARY SCHEMES, SESSION 1890.
Notices of two intended competing railways to pass under
Oxford Street were deposited with the Vestry in November,
1889.
One of these, the Central London (Subway) Railway, was
almost identical in character with the scheme bearing the
name of the London Central (Subway) Railway, in the
previous year, except as regards the proposed route. The
promoters sought powers which, if granted, would virtually
hand over a leading arterial thoroughfare to them for a
considerable period, and believing that an underground
railway could not be constructed without causing very
considerable inconvenience or loss to the owners and