National Safety Congress
Page 57
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Safety Workers Want Doors and Indicators on Buses
THE fitting of power-operated doors to public service vehicles should continue as a voluntary development at the discretion of individual operators, Mr. Raymond Birch, representing the Public Transport Association, told the National Safety Congress in London, last week. Operators were "neither fools nor ghouls," and if they were satisfied that to provide automatic doors was practicable and would save accidents, they would do so.
Mr. Birch was opposing a resolution placed before the congress road safetyforum proposing that all public service vehicles should have power-operated doors under the control of the driver, and that they should have mechanical indicators. The resolution was carried.
Mr. A. E. Rowsell, chief constable of Exeter, said that unless there was some physical obstruction, people would continue to jump on and off buses. He thought that doors could be fitted without great technical difficulty. Mr. Rowsell conceded that the incorporation of doors would slow down the operation of buses, but thought that people would quickly become accustomed to them and be ready on the platform to alight when the bus stopped.
Accidents at Crossings
On the second point of the resolution, Mr. Rowsell said that a large number of accidents occurred at road intersections where signals were necessary.
"We have no complaint whatever about bus crews. We think they are doing a first-class job of work, but we think there is a physical difficulty about it [hand signals]. The rear portion of the bus is so far away from the front that the slightest turn obstructs the driver's signal," he said.
Saying that the fitting of indicators should be left to the discretion of operators, Mr. Birch pointed out that if a compulsorily installed indicator failed, an offence would be committed. The more complicated buses were, the more expensive they were, and in the end the public had to pay for them in higher fares. Olt H. Teagle (Wells, Som.), who had been driving public service vehicles.
for 26 years, said: "Drivers are not made a standard size, and even the long-armed driver has considerable difficulty in giving the correct road signals, as the driver's seat is about I ft. from the door."
The only way to signal was to lean well over towards the window, thereby risking loss of firm control of the steering wheel. Hand signals 'could not be seen at night.
Another bus driver, Car. T. Pearson (Eccles, Swinton and Irlam), said in
support that the standardization of controls on buses was essential to road safety. Among 70 vehicles at the depot at which he was employed, there were five different types of gearbox, and it was possible for a driver to use each type in one day.
On the question of single-deck crushload buses, a number of which was operated in his area, Cllr. Pearson said that although they carried almost as many passengers as double-deckers, they were operated on the same time schedule as conventional single-deckers, thereby increasing the risk of accidents. Mr. R. A. Lovell, deputy Chief engineer (mechanical), Ministry of Transport, said that a number of opera tors had fitted doors on vehicles. "The important point has already been made.
It depends on the type of service the vehicle is engaged upon as to whether you can have doors without unduly interfering with the service," he said.
In London, the doors would have to come under the control of the conduc tor. The driver had far too much to do in the crowded streets to give his attention to opening and closing doors.
Again, in London, doors would mean that traffic would be slowed up by about 3 per cent., and more buses would have to be used. "Consider the number of times they [doors] would have to be operated in the London streets. If they did go wrong, the bus would have to stop and wait for another but to take away the passengers," he declared.
Mr. Lovell said that semaphore signals had shown a number of serious defects. New laws allowed the fitting of flashing indicators, and more operators were using them in preference.
Better Roads and Pedestrian Control
IN a talk on "Road Safety—Retrospect land Prospect," Sir Howard Roberts, clerk to the London County Council and chairman of the national executive committee of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, said that total casualties on the roads in 1953 were 226,770, of which 5,090 were fatal. This compared with 233,359 casualties in 1938, 6,648 of which were fatal.
So far this year, the number of deaths was lower than the figures for 1953, but the total casualties might well equal those of before the war if road users were not careful in the' near future.
In the interests of greater safety, the Society wished for better roads and some control of pedestrians.
Saying that this country had the greatest density of vehicles on its roads, Mr. G. E. Scott, chief constable of Sheffield, envisaged the time when, as in America, motorists would be obliged to leave their cars at points on the perimeter of Britain's cities and complete their journeys by public transport,
Criticizing the indiscriminate parking of cars in Manchester, CBI.. A. Donovan, chairman of Manchester Public Safety Committee, said that that city's wide roads were provided to enable the products of industry to pass through. "What happens?" be asked.
People think they have a right to park. . . If we had parking meters in Manchester, half the motorists would disappear overnight.:'
Law to Prevent Bunching ?
A T a road safety "parliament," a delegate asked whether legislation, or moral persuasion, could be used to encourage lorry drivers to keep 50 yd. apart. This was particularly applicable on such highways as the Great North Road,
Another delegate called for legislation on the use of roads not built for the purpose by carriers of abnormal loads.
Maj. H. R. Watling, chairman, National Committee on Cycling, suggested a diagonal white line along the length of vehicles drawing trailers as giving some indication to cyclists that a trailer was being drawn.