• Five Decades of Commercial Road Transport
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Extracts from a Lecture Given by Mr. E. S. Shrapnell-Smith, C.B.E., A4.1nst.T., Before the Institute of Transport THE first Henry Spurner Memorial Lectur to be delivered was given at the institutionof Electrical Engineers, Savoy Place, London, W.C.2, on Monday last, by Mr. E. S. Shrapnell-Smith, C.B E, M.Inst.14, a former vice-president of the Institute of Transpott. The period covered by the lecturer was 50 years, for it was on December 10,• 1895, that a meeting was held in the Pillar Hall, Cannon Street Hotel; which was attended by E bout 350 people, Mr. Shrapnell-Smith being one of them. It was resolved at this meeting to form a national organization to be called the Self-propelled Traffic Association.
It was in 1897 that Henry Spurrier's first steam vehicle, carrying a load of 10 cwt., won a silver medal in a test between Crewe and Congleton, the event being under the auspices of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. In London, in 1897, Carter Paterson. Globe Express, Suttons, Harrods, Libertys, Peter Jones and D. H. Evans had already become users of motor vans experimentally.
Electrically driven vehicles became prominent, for a period, up to about 1910, but thereafter waned tor a number of reasens. The lecturer dealt with a number of vehicle trials which were held in those early days, and whilst many excellent performances were put up, three years was about the average life of those machines as they were too light for the imposed load and constant running.
The first 3-ton lorry to be seen—and heard—on regular daily service in London was a Napier 25 h.p. vehicle, which was operated by Mayhew's Flour Mills. This was in 190L In December of the same yezlir Foden and Thornycroft machines gained distinction in War Department trials at Aldershot.
• In 1905 there were 75 passenger vehicles in operation in London, of which the London Road Car Co. had 19, the , London Motor Omnibus Co. 16, Tillings 12, the L.G.O.C. 4, and Brick Bros 3. Early in the same year came the introduction of " The Commercial Motor" and its contemporary Motor Traction." The decade closed with about 20,000 motor vehicles of all types registered in the U.K. In 1906 the dust nuisance was attacked seriously, and it was the late Sir Henry Maybury, while County Engineer and Surveyor of Kent, who gave a splendid lead by introducing the tarring of all main roads in that county.
Some Early Prejudices Prejudice and opposition to motorbuses and goods vehicles were strongly in evidence until early in 1909, when there were signs of a more moderate view obtaining.
In the R.A.C. trials of 1907 the principal awards for vehicles carrying loads of three tons and upwards went to Commer, Dennis, Hanford, Maudslay and Thornycroft petrol-driven vehicles, Savage and Yorkshire steam-driven machines, and to the Burrell and Foster steam tractors.
It was on March 23, 1907, that London witnessed the arrival of the taxicab, for on that date a fleet of twocylindered Renault cabs first stirred up public interest. The first thousand motorbuses to be licensed in London wai in March, 1908.
The lecturer then brings its to the 1914-1918 war period and he tells us that on August 4, 1914, 1,200 commercial vehicles were assembled in Hyde Park, London. This decade closed with 84,000 goods vehicles and 44,00 hackney machines registered in the United Kingdom. The home consumption of motor spirit had risen to 101,000,000 gallons in 1913.
Passing all too quickly through this admirable historical document of the progress of motorized transport in this country we find that in the third decade there were considerable improvements in the standard of road maintenance, and important developments in tyre construction. In Great Britain and the U.S.A. pneumatic tyres. of from 6 to 13 ins. in diameter, were being thoroughly tested from year to year, but progress was not marked until 1916, when the Goodyear concern in America, and Dunlop in this country, began, as the author 'says, to see daylight.
The fitting of electric starters to commercial vehicles began in 1919, and became more common in 1920 and 1922. Each decade showed an increase in the total number of vehicles licensed, the figures at the end of 1925 being 236,000 goods and 103,000 hackney. The home consumption of motor spirit had risen to 500,000,000 gallons annually: Mr. Shrapnell-Smith opens the fourth decade on matters dealing with taxation; he tells us later on that New Scotland Yard gave general approval for the use of double-deckers in December, 1927, and for the general use of pneumatic tyres on such vehicles in March, 1928, The big event of 1928 was the securing of general road transport powers by the four main-line railway companies. A' Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament sat for 37 days before reaching, by a narrow majority, a decision in favour of the powers sought. This decade also saw the inauguration of the vogue of the compression-ignition engine. There were 440 000 goods vehicles and 87,000 hackneys registered at the close of 1935.
Tightening of Government Controls In dealing with the 1935-45 period, the lecturer refers to it as one which has seen the tightening of Government control, under the Acts of 1930, 1931 and 1933, and Emergency War Legislation. Whilst the Road Haulage Association, says the author, was disappointed at the decision to extend the M.O.W.T. Road Haulage Organization for a considerable further period, instead of allowing its plans for a commercial taking-over to fructify, the membership, clearly, is composed of the right men fo undertake any transport jobs, whatever they may prove to be when altered circumstances obtain. If zoning persists on the score of national economy, it may well prove that some road transport facilities Will be redundant, but there must always be such facilities on a large scale: the country cannot carry on without them.
Mr. Shrapnell-Smith, in closing his remarks relative to the fifth decade, gave some figures of war savings in, the road transport industry, excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland. The grand total shown is £5,005,000, but, as the speaker said, the full figure for the industry might well be nearer 0,000,000, as there were members of street groups or groups run by ancillary users, and 26 municipal undertakings, being merged in authorities' general groups, could not show .separate returns.
Part Two of the paper is entitled "Inferences About the Future," and is divided into 14 sub-divisions, as follow:— A, operation for hire or reward; B. operation under C licences; C, on finding a rates structure; D, quotas and pools; E, voluntary grouping; F, taxation and road costs; G, track cost equalization; H, licensing procedure; I, percentages of gross revenue absorbed by (a) salaries and wages, and (b) capital; J, education, scholarships and training of personnel: K, vogue of compression ignition; L, fuels, lubricants, and tyres; M, sundry matters; N, summary.
Mr. Shrapnell-Smith says that announcements relative to the projected nationalization of the road transport industry. do not preclude the continued examination of many, if not all, existing and likely problems.
His Views on nationalization, however, are not likely to be favourably received by members of the industry who are determined to Mit up a strong fight for their very existence.
The writing of so important a paper as this must have represented a formidable task, in which the author, quite obviously, has spared no pains •to present factual matter of the greatest interest, where he might have been excused had he resorted to generalizations.