B.R.S.Bedford Fleet Cut By a Quarter
Page 34
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
IN a reserved decision, Mr. W. P. S. Ormond, Eastern Licensing Authority, has reduced by about a quarter the A-licence fleet of 13ritish Road Services based at Bedford. They applied to transfer 45 vehicles, including 13 articulated units (274+ tans) and 17 trailers (43 tons), from Northampton to Bedford. They have been granted 33 vehicles (including 12 articulated units and 12 trailers), totaling 231 tons.
Mr. Ormond says that the 12 purchasers of the 20 licensed vehicles and seven trailers which B.R.S. sold with their Bedford depot in March, 1955. should be protected against abstraction. Eleven of the buyers opposed the application.
As reported in The Commercial Motor on November 27 and December 18, 1959, there were altogether 52 objectors. It was complained that B.R.S. had transferred the vehicles Without authority.
Mr. Ormond says that the main purpose of the application was •to move the bulk of the B.R.S. vehicles from Northampton to Bedford, so that they would be closer to the works of the London Brick Co., Ltd., at Stewartby (six miles from Bedford and 28 miles from Northampton), and to the Marston ValleyBrick plant at Ridgmont, 11 miles from Bedford and 15-16 miles from Northampton. About 90 per cent. of the total work to be done from Bedford depot would be concerned with bricks, mainly from Stewartby and Ridgmont.
Unnecessary Dead Mileage
B.R.S. emphasized the dead mileage incurred by five vehicles on a trunk service from Luton to Bridgend, Glamorgan, when the vehicles were operated from Northampton. There was no claim that any new work originating in Bedford required the transfer of vehicles.
Some 45 vehicles had been based at Northampton, and in the two years to July 11 last they showed a slight drop in total earnings and mileage. Nine more vehicles had been transferred from the West Midlands to the East Midlands from May 7 last, but they were never employed in the East Midlands, and were brought directly to Bedford.
Not Heavily Employed • There was no evidence of difficulty in sub-contracting by B.R.S. The 45 Northampton-based vehicles earned about £166,000 a year, which, in Mr. Ormond's view, did not show heavy employment of the fleet. Although Marston Valley had increased their output from 445m. to 500m. bricks a year within two years, there was no evidence of a shortage of transport.
The Licensing Authority qualifies his statement on the protection of buyers of B.R.S. vehicles with the words: "The protection of existing hauliers in such circumstances will, of course, depend to a large degree on the justification from the customers' point of view of an applicant's desire to change his base.". Mr. Ormond calculates that not more than 29 vehicles have been employed on B28 the haulage of bricks, and 28 of them from Stewartby and Ridgmont. In addition, there were , the five trunk lorries.
Announcing his decision to grant 33 vehicles arid 12 semi-trailers, he says that it is in the interests of users that vehicles should be based as near to them as may be operationally economic and, subject to this factor, in the traffic area where the work is situated. The grant will not' take effect until the period within which an appeal may be made has expired, or until an appeal has been disposed of.
[The case is likely to be discussed by the national licensing committee of the Road Haulage 'Association next Wednesday. They may decide to sup port an appeal.]