21 YEARS IN THE PASSENGER-TRANSPORT INDUSTRY
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The "Northern General" Celebrates Its 21st Birthday EARLY this month the Northern General Transport Co., Ltd., Chesterle-Street, Durham, celebrated its 21st anniversary, the Gateshead and District Tramways Co., Ltd., the forerunner of the company, having commenced a service from Low Fell to Chester-le-Street on May 7,. 1913, Straker-Squire double-deck buses being employed. From that date headway was made, and additional StrakerSquires and Daimlers were bought..
The growth of bus activity was such that the Gateshead concern deemed it advisable to form a separate organization, and the Northern General company was registered on November 29, 1913. On January 1, 1914, the buses were taken over from the Gateshead company.
Now that much attention is focused upon the use of compressed gas for motor vehicles, it is instructive to recall that the company successfully experimented with alternative fuels, including coal gas, during the war. Another interesting fact is that, even in those days, bus operators suffered from competition with small cars.
In an informative and copiously illustrated booklet describing the history of the company it is shown that the post-war development began in about the middle of 1919, when the total bus fleet numbered 49 vehicles. In 1921, tours were inaugurated and from that date this side of the business has made greai progress.
At the end of 1930, when the Road Traffic Act was passed, the company ran 48 services and the fleet num
bered 373 vehicles. At the end of the past year, the corresponding figures were 56 and 386.
During 1933, 11,989,672 miles were run and 40,055,893 passengers were carried, as compared with 814,283 and 1,371,389 respectively in 1913, when 16 vehicles operated on six routes. Although some 1,200,000 vehiclejourneys were made last year, on only 80 occasions did vehicles fail to reach their destinations at the scheduled time, or within a few minutes of it.
So far, as maintenance is concerned, the practice of completely stripping a vehicle at a predetermined period has been abandoned, being replaced by a system under which individual units are overhauled at certain periods.
An important phase of the company's activities last year was the production of a six-wheeled side-engined bus.