PASSENGER TRAVEL NEWS.
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The Latest Doings and Developments in the Bus and Coach World.
PASSENGER SERVICES IN YORKSHIRE.
Details of Bus Activities in the West Riding with Particular Reference to Difficulties which have Arisen with Certain Municipal Authorities.
WITH nearly four million people congregated in almost a score of towns, each with its own centre of interest, but all closely interconnected, the West Riding of Yorkshire has presented an ideal ground for the development of motorbus services. Municipal tramway services were firmly entrenched in this area before the coming of the motorbus, but when the bus did come on the scene it was sponsored, by one-vehicle proprietors, the municipal authorities, and what are now big private companies like the West Riding Automobile Co., Ltd., and the Barnsley and District Traction Co., Ltd., who have been long established in the business. The small owner, often with a converted lit,ht vehicle, was, in many cases, the pioneer in developing services which are to-day busy bus routes on which smart, up-to-date, and specially built vehicles run.
With the rapid growth of services and the keen competition which has been experienced, there are to-day probably more passenger-carrying vehicles in the West Riding of Yorkshire than in any part of the country, London, perhaps, excepted. The large number of proprietors has meant that many types and many makes of bus have been adopted. Events have moved rapidly in vehicle design during the past year or two, but many of the omnibuses on the roads in the West Riding of Yorkshire are of recent manufacture and 'representative of the best on the road to-day. They are, indeed, as representative of up-to-date English practice as is likely to be found anywhere, incorporating, as many of them do, such modern features as everhead-valve engines, low load-line chassis and large pneumatic tyres.
Conditions of operation to-day differ in parts of the Riding, due to the varying circumstances which prevail. Almost every town has had its fight with the local authority, the municipal versus private enterprise battle being fought with vigour on account of the tramway interests. In Leeds the fight was a keen one, the Leeds City Council insisting that vehicles should come net farther than the tramway termini and that, if they started in Leeds, they . should neither pick up nor set down passengers on the tramway route.
The Ministry of Transport would not support this position, however, and matters have been arranged more satisfactorily; but the position is still far from a happy one. IFfow the position would have stood had not the owners been united it is difficult to imagine, but it is stated that ground has been given away, by independent action in individual cases. Meanwhile Leeds sought to run extensive trolley-bus services outside the city, but this scheme was not sanctioned by Parliament.
In Bradford a curious position has had the effect of holding in abeyance, for a period of eighteen months, the applications for a number of licences for services. This is due to the determined opposition of the Bradford Licensing Committee to any service coming into the city over the tramway routes. The Ministry of Transport has, however, for the first time in any part of the country, now' taken the decisive step of making an Order to the effect that the Watch and Licensing Committee must issue licences-to the West Riding Automobile Co., Ltd.. who applied for permission to run a through
service. Failure to do so will mean that the.cornmittee will lay itself open to the issue of a writ of mandamus by the Ministry, returnable at the high Courts.
This has brought to a head an incident of a very protracted nature which has been closely followed. Interest in the case has been increased because when a similar position arose a year ago the Ministry of Transport declined to take the fateful step •at the last moment, and the idea was current that the Ministry had not, in law, the power to enforce the Order they had given to the corporation. The whole matter has been thrashed out again, however, and the transport industry as a whole owes a debt of gratitude to the West Riding Automobile Co., Ltd., for the persistence and determination they have shown in bringing the matter to a head. There has been everything against the company, although they had undoubtedly a good case from the beginning. While these protracted negotiations have been in progress, the applications of up to a score of companies for powers to run omnibuses in Bradford have been pigeon-holed, and the city has been deprived of these private services.
A curious point in connection with the affair has been that the Bradford Tramways Dept. the pioneer of railless vehicles, whilst strongly protesting that 'there was no form of vehicle -whielf could equal the trolley-bus on routes where the laying of tramways Was not justified on the ground of expense, has been making tests with a number of types of motor vehicle. There is every prospect, therefore, that the city will have its own motorbuses on the streets before very long and, probably, running over routes which are more congested than the Wakefield Road, along which the authorities object to a private company running services on account of the volume of traffic.
In the Pontefract district a line of trams run by a Drivate company has
been discontinued in favour of motor omnibuses, and at Keighley the municipal tramway authorities have adopted double-deck railless vehicles in place of the trams.
At Keighley, where the work of reinstating the road after the removal of the tram track ia now practically completed, there has been a very marked improvement in conditions, and traffic appears to be much more free to inanceuvre in the available road apace than was formerly the case. .
The keenest advocates of the policy of allowing the free entrance of motorbuses to the towns and cities have been shopkeepers, and in both Leeds and Bradford the traders organizations have taken active steps in support of the motorbus owners. The effect the motorbus has had in conveying people from one centre to another has been indicated by the action of the railway companies. Railway takings must have been seriously affected by motorbus competition, for not only were liberal fare reductions given on market days in the first instance, but now, in almost every part of the West Riding, return tickets are issued on the railways every day after ten o'clock at single fare for the double journey.