Motorbus Well and Motorvan Trade.
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We do not support the view that there is any outraged public feeling in regard to the matter of fatal street accidents in London. Public opinion, very
properly, is watchful—nothing more. That position is not one to be feared. it is only certain. sections of the Press, and those in spasmodic fashion—pos sibly when short of other topics, which have endeavoured to agitate in that direction. The paucity of response, now as on previous occasions, is reflected in the absence of sustained correspondence. The cry which " drew " silly-season writers five and more years ago is no longer of journalistic use. Recent questions in Parliament have caused many thinking people, in which category we class those who pay heed to the circumstances which give. rise to the accidents as well as to the actual fatalities, to ask themselves what can be done. We have asked ourselves that question, from time to time, ever since motorbus traffic began to become common throughout Greater London, but we are obliged to confess that no acceptable and practical means of ridding modern traffic of all its concomitant risks have been forthcoming. From our side, we have in earlier issues advanced at least two proposals. These are : (a) that the numbers of motorbuses plying for hire along particular highways within the inner zones of London should be kept down to the minima required, by some scheme of inner-zone vehicles which should at all times be run as nearly full as possible ; (b) that efforts should be made to bring into service some specialized form of cowcatcher " which shall really be applicable to motorbus requirements.
We are strongly against wholesale and ill-considered speed-ustriction proposals. In the first place, the streets of London are rendered the less congested the quicker the traffic is allowed to move over them; iu the second place, it will be a bad day for this country when we begin to regulate the traffic of the capital of the Empire by the mediocre needs of the slowest members of the community, or of those who, unhappily for their own safety, possess the smallest measure of mental alertness.
There is much to be said for a further term of patient investigation as the public attitude, and we believe the desired measure of forbearance will be granted unstintingly. Nobody can regard with apathy the fact that 118 persons, according to the official records, were killed by motorbuses in Greater London from the 1st January last to the 8th Met., but the history of all improvements in locomotion, and particularly of changes in method of locomotion, provide evidence which supports the view that such untoward accidents occur for a term only. The term necessarily varies, and the openingup of many fresh motorbus routes may have something to do with the relatively-high totals that are still being put forward in this connection. It is, also, overlooked that, since more people travel, there are more in the streets at times.
. Against the general high record, the absence of increase in accidents which occur in the City of London, where the motorbus traffic is by far the densest, and where fatalities have not exceeded five per quarter for the past 18 months, provides much food for thought. We have already contended that the absence of tramcars is the fundamental explanation. The proposal that the Home Office or the Commissioner of Police should be generally authorized to hunt the number of motorbuses to be licensed is in some cases a most-dangerous one, by reason of the fact that the proprietors now in possession of the routes would virtually be given a monopoly by any such decision. We have reason to believe that a change in the law of that nature will not occur, or at least will not be seriously discussed until all other possible remedies have been exhausted.
The formation of a London Traffic Board cannot be delayed, on any reasonable grounds, for more than another year or two, and we find more hope for the future in the regulation of traffic and traffic arteries by such a board, than we do in the limitation of the number of licences, with its likely inconvenience to the public at large. Much can be done by a selection of streets for one-way traffic. Practically nothing in that direction has yet been done, if we except a few streets.
The importance of fair treatment for motorbuses, in this matter of accident data throughout London, can not be exaggerated, when one comes to consider its bearing upon collateral branches of commercial motoring in all parts of the country. We already have detected proofs of an inclination on the part of some local councillors to create a scare about motorvans. We have frequently had occasion to refer to the extraordinary feature of sympathetic movement which exists between the motorbus world in London and the great motorvan movement throughout the country. When London motorbus undertakings were depressed and in a parlous state financially, some four years ago, the motorvan trade was almost stagnant. Those who tried to sell vehicles were asked how it was possible to make them pay, in the conveyance of merchandise, when the London omnibus companies could not make like machines pay, with every facility at their disposal, with custom waiting for them in every street, and with higher rates for the " live " loads than were obtainable for any " dead " load. The revival of the fortunes of motorbus undertakings, in corresponding fashion, occurred contemporaneously with the certain establishment of innumerable motorvan equipments. It is, therefore, no light matter for owners at large, or for the manufacturers and traders who have so much money employed to good purpose in the industry, that these fatal-accident statistics should be allowed to rest where they are. We believe that London motorbuses have a big percentage of the total fatal accidents charged against them, and so entered on paper, when other traffic units are really to blame. Anything that can be done to establish the real facts of the case will assuredly be helpful all round. The truth is wanted. We have not yet got it in full. Finally, we reiterate our view that there is no adverse body of public feeling on this question of motorbus accidents, and we believe that comparative refusal to be "worked up" by tramcar interests is due to the fact that the most-searching investigations, for which all the coroners' juries concerned have been responsible, have shown that blame attaches to the drivers of the motorbuses only in a very small percentage indeed of the cases to which we refer. It none the less behoves the omni bus companies, and particularly their traffic and
training departments, not to relax their Pfforts ruthlessly to weed out drivers who "play to the gallery" by attempting fancy tricks when at the wheel. There are such men, we regret to say, and
they may not safely be put in charge of six tons gross, with a 30 h.p. engine to move it about, in the streets of London. That is one direction in which the companies can undoubtedly do more still in their own interests, although we admit that their difficulties are great at the moment, seeing that new men have to be brought into line every week. In addition to further precautions thereanent, we trust that one or other of the proprietors' spokesmen in the House of Commons will without delay put down a question with the object of securing an analysis of the alleged motorbus accidents, in such a manner that the incidence of those which are really due to other vehicles, and of those which occur in streets where electric-tramcar traffic also exists, will be thrown into proper relief.