Public Service in the Provinces.
Page 2
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Provincial trade, which was particularly cultivated by our " Country Estates and Hotel " special number of 15th February, 1906, has developed, as we anticipated, in the chars-i-bancs and hotel-omnibus branches. New areas. whether in Great Britain or Ireland, have steadily been opened. to the tourist and sportsman by public services : the example of the Great Western Railway Company, the Sutherland Motor Traffic Company and other pioneers of modern commercial motoring is now of greater effect than ever before : no argument can stand against the fact that hundreds of proved motor-coaches are to-day in regular use. although the capital value has been written down out of revenue to below £100 apiece in the books of many owners. Bad results—often through incompetent management or other spasmodic effort—have to be admitted : they, however, are the proper measure of neither the present nor the future. Next came the motorcab, and nearly 2,000 of these servants of the public have come into use in the Provinces since this journal's " Motorcab Special " of the 30th April, 1908, was perused by the largest johmasters, hotel proprietors who have livery stables, and the leading garage managers throughout the United Kingdom. The fact that an extra-large issue was practically exhausted, and that we had to reserve the last 50 copies at 2s. 6d. each, is another evidence of the practical moves that were prompted by its contents. These sections of the trade are ripe for new extensions and sales, because there are, for each district which has so far evinced the necessary degree of intelligence to grant licenses, at least two whose local councillors have deferred the inevitable from a mistaken sense of kindness to the passing horse-cab and horse-coach interests. This cpnot go on, and proofs of a revulsion of feeling in favour of motors are accumulating. Authorities which, 18 months ago, would not entertain proposals for motorbuses or motorcabs are converted : jobmasters who feared that expenses must exceed income have found the classes of hire so unusual, and the " special " orders so numerous, that the best of them are ready to admit the arrival of another prosperous era for their businesses; above all, the public taste has grown with—if not in advance of—supply. The obvious sequel has been a maintained series of orders, mostly for small numbers of vehicles; yet this unostentatious progress provides an aggregate which only yields in importance to that which has been achieved in the Metropolis. Manufacturers and their district agents will, none the less, do well to remember that the average country jobmaster is no man of means, but is very often heavily mortgaged on his stock. There is money in it for financiers, if they choose to find a few thousands here and there, whether they purchase and operate chars-asbancs or cabs. They should be " discovered " in their own localities. an not every case left to the " big company from London."