Rail Attack on Extended Tours
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ANEW phase of railway opposition was set forth in an appeal by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Co., at Manchester, last Saturday. On each of two licences authorizing " all-in " tours to Weston-super-Mare and the south coast, the Northwestern Traffic Commissioners had allowed 10 additional picking-up paints to Mr. G. Helliwell, of Clitheroe.
Mr. R. R. Smylie, for the appellant, argued that these extra picking-up points would mean wasteful competition and abstraction of traffic from the railways. There was, he contended, a subtle change in these tours.
When they originated, they were described as sightseeing tours through country not on any railway route. They had now become a direct tour to some well-known holiday resort and the passengers spent their full stay at that resort. These tours were really express services in disguise, competing with the main-line railway.
Mr. H. Backhouse (C.M.U.A. solicitor) replied that there was no difference between an extended tour in which the party stayed at a different hotel every night and one where an hotel at one resort was the headquarters for the whole tour. Every day, but one, of the stay was occupied in touring through the neighbourhood visited.
To understand the system of pickingup points, one had to know Lancashire wake-weeks holiday arrangenints. It was recognized by the Commissioners that, in these tours, not all the picking-up points were in use at once. The operators had to travel around with the wakes weeks.
Some operators had applied for 60 picking-up points, but each was used for only one week in the year.