Editing Stationary engine (section)

===Cable haulage railways===
Industrial railways in quarries and mines made use of [[cable railway]]s based on the [[Canal inclined plane|inclined plane]] idea, and certain early passenger railways in the UK were planned with lengths of cable-haulage to overcome severe gradients.

For the first proper railway, the [[Liverpool and Manchester Railway|Liverpool and Manchester]] of 1830, it was not clear whether [[locomotive]] traction would work, and the railway was designed with steep 1 in 100 gradients concentrated on either side of [[Rainhill]], just in case.  Had cable haulage been necessary, then inconvenient and time-consuming shunting would have been required to attach and detach the cables.  The Rainhill gradients proved not to be a problem, and in the event, locomotive traction was determined to be a new technology with great potential for further development.

The steeper 1 in 50 grades from Liverpool down to the docks were operated by cable traction for several decades until locomotives improved. Cable haulage continued to be used where gradients were even steeper.

Cable haulage did prove viable where the gradients were exceptionally steep, such as the 1 in 8 gradients of the [[Cromford and High Peak Railway]] opened in 1830.  Cable railways generally have two tracks with loaded wagons on one track partially balanced by empty wagons on the other, to minimize fuel costs for the stationary engine.  Various kinds of [[rack railway|rack railways]] were developed to overcome the lack of friction of conventional locomotives on steep gradients.

These early installations of stationary engines would all have been steam-powered initially.