A PROGRESSIVE GLOUCESTER BUS CONCERN.
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Supplying the.Wants of Thinly Populated Districts. , ..... ........... ............. .... ,............
1 IF ONE takes a map, such as that pubfished in the T.B.R. monthly guide,
• showing the motorbus services interconectin,; town, village and hamlet, one is at once struck with the magnitude of the passenger-vehicle industry of the country. At first glance it would appear that wherever mankind is gathered together, except in those places where the, nature of the terrain introduces peculiar difficulties, there exists the bus service,. bringing sparsely populated areas into. touch with the larger distributing. centres.
There are still, however, many thinly inhabited areas which are untapped, and the following, short description serves to illu.strate. the potentialities of a small passenger service, provided it be started in u district which will offer a remunerative 'return and with reliable and coin.: fortable vehicles.
Messrs. Davis and Sops,of Westgate Street, ,Gloucester, first entered the ranks of the passenger-carrying movement in 1920, when they put into service a Straker-Squire 0.0.4 bus. The firm comprised two brothers, who had kith soon service in the war, and the initial service was, more or less, a yen. tare to test the pulse of the district. A daily service was commenced from Gloucester comprising three journeys per day and calling at Newent and Ledbury. The news of the success of this servieo very soon spread to the outlying namless of Gorsley and Kilcot, the inhabitants of which became so insistent in their demands for road motor facilities that Messrs. Davis extended the service to these two places, each of which received calls three days in the week.
After the successful establishment of the 'services the ssid model .StrakerSquire bus vas replaced by one of the company's latest A types from the Edmonton factory, and with an additional bus of another make services are now being run to Newent.and Ross. An excellent view of the Cotswolds and Mal'seri. Hills is .obtained en route to the ffrel .named place. The .service to Ross —a market town—is .run every Thursday, when a full complement of paseengess market-bound is carried.
Messrs. Davis are distinctly enterprising, and every 'Wednesday a special service of theatre buses is run from the outlyingsdistricts into Gloucester—a feature which is much appreciated by the natives.
The firm arrange private trips for works, choir and club outings to Westonsuper-Mare, Wye Valley, Bath and Bristol, Stratford-on-Avon, etc., as well as circular tours, which include on their itineraries Tewkesbury, Pershore, Ryesham, Cheltenham, Malvexn, Hereford, Symonds Yat and Boss. Messrs. Davis are putting a StrakerSquire A-type motor coach into service during the 1922 season, which will be used for day and half-day trips to places of interest within hail of Gloucester.
We illustrate on this page the singledeck bus, which must :certainly prove a boon to the areas which it serves. There is little doubt that small but progressive undertakings, such a.s Messrs. Davis, form the nucleus of organizations -which are destined to play a big and increasingly beneficial part in the passenger transport world.