-id. a Ton-mile Rate on Modern Railway
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A STREAMLINED and paitly automatic railway could work trunk hauls at about id. per ton-mile, said Sir Reginald Wilson member of the British Transport Commission and chairman of the Eastern Area Board, when he addressed the British Institute of Management in Brighton last week.
The railways had allowed .themselves in the past 20 years to be elbowed out of the most suitable traffics into the less suitable, and therefore out of their low into their high cost ranges. This would have to be reversed • by sound price policies and a firmer commercial attitude. '
He warned managers of large concerns to expect the railways to become more selective in their treatment of customers. The customer whowould be treated best wOuld have treated the railway's best, and, in particular; -any customer prepared to come to a properservice agreement to cover predicted traffic flows on a properly organized basis for a sufficient period of time would find that much better rates could be offered him.
Sir Reginald added that even vastly improved services could not be sold at a reasonable price if they were constantly under. propaganda attack, and if every blemish were magnified by sections of the public who made it their business to bring the railways down.
It was possible to move by one train his. ton-miles a day, and throughputs of 25,000-ton miles an hour with two men were quite feasible. No other form of land transport could touch such figures, he claimed.