P.T.A. Want Commissioners to Inquire into Traffic Orders
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R[COMMENDATIONS on the procedure to be followed by local authorities in making traffic regulation orders have been submitted to the Ministry of Transport by the Public Transport Association.
The recommendations arose out of a draft memorandum setting out the Minister's proposed regulations, following the amendment of Section 46 (2) of the Road Traffic Act, 1930, as amended by Section 29 (4) of the Road and Rail Traffic Act, 1933, and Section 33 of the Road Traffic Act, 1956.
The P.T.A. emphasized the importance of the regulations providing for the chairman of the Traffic Commis
sioners to conduct any public inquiry into a proposed Order. They claimed that that would obviate the danger of the Commissioners committing themselves to support an. Order before they could have any knowledge of operators' views on it.
Notice of proposals to make Orders or hold public inquiries should be inserted in Notices and Proceedings of the traffic area in which the affected roads were situated. The memorandum stated that a proposal to make an Order should be published in a local newspaper for two consecutive weeks, and in the official Gazette, but that notice of a public inquiry or the making of an Order should appear only once in a local newspaper.
The Association felt "most strongly " that the report of an inspector who had conducted an inquiry should be made public as a matter of routine. They commented that a public inquiry was one of the main safeguards to operators, and it would be weakened if it were possible for a council to repudiate recommendations made by the inspector without it being publicly known, Plans and maps showing the area affected should be made available for inspection at the same time as notice of the proposal, or of an inquiry, was published, not, as was suggested, after the Order had been made. The proposed period for lodging objection should be extended from 21 to 28 days.
The Association pointed out that the making, by a council, of an Order relating to one-way streets invariably involved operators in substantial re-routeing and in variations of their road service licences. As it was possible, under Section 46 (3) of the Act, for the Minister to revoke an Order, they expressed the hope that to save unnecessary work he would, in suitable eases, make inquiries through his divisional road engineers before an Order became law.