OPERATING BUSES WITHOUT ACCIDENTS.
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The Risks that are Run by Small Owners and the Means Whereby Accidents Can be Avoided or Minimized.
By Sidney E. Garcke, M.111fech.E. (Chairman or Director of Many Public Transport Undertakings).
T"CONCLUSION of the proceedings before the coroner in connection with the disastrous omnibus fire at Nuneaton makes it possible to comment freely upon the circumstances of this particular case, and also in regard to recent public-service fires and accidents generally.
The evidence in the Nuneaton case tends to confirm the view widely held that regulations in regard to the use of public service vehicles are more urgently necessary than restrictions of a constructional character. I do not suggest that it is unnecessary to lalace some limitation on the freedom at present enjoyed by the omnibus designer, although many suggestions which have been put forward have a touch of grandmother" about them, and it is clearly undesirable to make more restrictions in regard to design than can possibly. be helped, lest in doing so we tend in the direction of stagnation. We must not cheek a national development which, up to the present, has been most remarkably rapid, and more so in Great Britain than in any other European country. We stand out as the one country that knows better than any other how to build an omnibus, and we have built up a great industry,with much employment on this development.
Whilst it has to be admitted that some constructional restriction is desirable; it is, in the opinion of many who have had long experience of the operation of fleets of omnibuses, far more important to impose strict, regulations in regard to the use of vehicles. It is necessary to eradicate these too-frequent disasters, which are giving a bad name to the omnibus trade as a whole, and many of which can be attributed to carelessness, lack of system, or lack of proper facilities and the necessary skilled labour for the adequate maintenance of those parts of the vehicle upon which public safety is dependent. In the Nuneaton ease, the evidence at the inquest, as reported, establishes:— "(a) That either the petrol tank had not been charged with sufficient fuel for the journey which the vehicle was about to undertake, or that the earburetter or other parts of the car were in a condition which caused an undue amount of petrol to be consumed so that the fuel ran out before the completion of the journey. '(b) That a spare can of petrol was carried on the ear, a practice not adopted by the large omnibus companies. "(c) The interior lighting system was out of order."
Now, in the case of the substantial omnibus companies, the charging of the fuel and oil tanks is the duty of a special staff detailed for the work. It is carried out at a spot selected for it safety, with the aid of plant designed for the purpose. Once a tank is filled, it is not opened again until the car is back at the filling station. A regulation, which must be strictly enforced by the police, that no public-service vehicle may have its tank opened on the highway unless all passengers first alight, and that no spare can of petrol shall be carried, would ensure in practice that the small owner takes the same care and provides the same plant as does the owner of a fleet. In the ease of the large omnibus companies, the maintenance of the vehicle itself is carried out on such a systematic basis, and so thoroughly that it is very seldom that a particular vehicle consumes more than u very small percentage in excess of the average, arid, in consequence, there is practically no chance of the vehicle accidentally running out of fuel on the road. The carriage of a spare can of petrol in the car is in itself a great source of danger. The maintenance of the electric lighting system in a special electrical workshop secures immunity from failure, and it has to be remembered that darkness on the occasion of an unavoidable accident adds greatly to the difficulties of those on the spot who endeavour to assist passengers, besides adding to the terror of the situation.
There has recently been a case of a public car running away with a load of passengers due to the failure of the brakes, and but for the extraordinary skill and fidelity to duty on the part of the driver, a serious loss of life would in all probability have resulted. Maintenance of brakes as well as of steering gear can be secured by the small owner by a sufficient exercise of care, although he is often at a great disadvantage, owing to the lack of properly equipped workshops and the financial impossibility of providing a special brake-examining and testing staff. Strict regulations in regard to the maintenance of these vital parts and tests by the police from time to time would do much to improve the situation.
Another important matter, although not one bearing upon the question of public safety, is that, before a proprietor is permitted to give a public service, he should furnish evidence of his ability to provide a spare vehicle in order to maintain the service which he has obligated himself to run,
Of course, prevention of an accident is the first object, but, if in spite of all precautions one occurs, then it is desirable to secure that the public may obtain sufficient monetary compensation. Every licensee should be required to furnish evidence that he is in a position, either by liquid reserve funds or by insurance, to meet his liabilities in this respect.
Mr. Lovat Fraser, writing recently in The Sunday Pictorial, puts the matter very shortly and clearly. He says : " I am a believer in the motor omnibuses, which are transforming the conditions of rural life. . Their charges are low, and on the whole their efficiency is highly creditable. I am writing of omnibuses which belong to good companies with substantial capital, and not of the half-obsolete vehicles run by small owners. Road transport requires capital just as much as railway transport."
It may not be pleasant to many to have to admit it, but it is clear that the omnibus industry is not a suitable one to be left in the hands of the '' small man and it is an undoubted fact that the imposing of reasonable restrictions in regard both to the eon etruction and the use of omnibuses, particularly the latter, are bound to tend in the direction of the omnibus services in the country being left to be carried out by the more responsible parties. Not until this
state of affairs is brought about shall we have extended to the whole of the country the comparative immunity from danger and inconvenience at present obtained in those few parts where, by the farseeing action of the local licensing authorities, the services have been placed in the hands of only substantial and responsible omnibus proprietors.