Towards the Correlation of Rates
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In an I. of T. Paper. Mr. Sewell Considers the Question of Reforming Both Road and Rail Rates
D AIL and road opinions on the ques'Aden of rates were equally fully explored by Mr. A. E. Sewell, Minst.T., chairman of the rail panel of the Road and Rail Conference, in a paper read to the Institute of Transport last Monday (February 10).
Mr. Sewell said that when the tumult caused by the nationalization proposals died, the matter of rates would have to be taken in hand and a decision—reached. What was needed was a system of charging that reflected the economic advantages and disadvantages of each form of inland transport and allowed the trader to use whichever pleased him most. At the same time, charges should be such that he was persuaded to dispatch his traffic by the organization best fitted to carry it.
No General Plan At the present time sthere was no order in road rates and no general plan of charging, Mr. Sewell contended. Whilst the railways had a general plan. 87 per cent. of the weight of merchandise was carried at exceptional rates, which represented a somewhat confused system. Now was a unique opportunity, while everything was in the melting pot, to produce a new railway rates system., capable of integration with the road system. It should spread the transport charges of the country impartially (not equally) over all users.
What mattered to a user was the total amount of his transport cost, in relation to his output, and the speaker saw no reason why exceptional rates could not be passed through a crucible and recast into a much simpler and more compact system of charging.
The advent of the haulier originally made it necessary to reduce railway rates, usually by a process of constant attrition, towards the general road level in the area affected. The haulier, who
had no interest in value of merchandise, had no use for the railway classification, and one consequence of the reduction of railway rates towards road levels has been a lack of consistent relationship between classification and the rates charged.
The Road Haulage Association's road scheme, which has necessarily had regard to the cost to the trader of doing his own transport under a C licence, whilst not entirely ignoring value, paid no regard to bulk in proportion to weight. If, in future, there were no effective C-licence competition over 40 miles, this might give more elbow room, but should not be a reason for high public transport charges, said Mr. Sewell. There would be a constant temptation to evade the law if, for longer distances, charges were unreasonable.
Dove-tailing Schedules
The intention was that the road scheme should be capable of being dove-tailed into a rail scheme . and, therefore, reach fulfilment of the word "correlation." The last-mentioned meant a linking together of rates and did not imply identical rates.
Returning to the rail views, the speaker said he could indicate broadly the direction in which their investigations had taken them. They included a new general merchandise classification, which, while still paying some regard to value, would bear much closer relationship to wagon loading.
Although it was still the intention to give individual exceptional rates, it was proposed to merge existing ones, commodity by commodity, to scales which would reflect the average of rates charged hitherto; providing a readymade exceptional rate for everyone. By and large, each trade would be asked to contribute to rail revenue in the same ratio as before.
The railways would like to take " smalls" by merchandise train out of classification and charge simply on weight and distance. Whether they would be able to do so remained to be seen, but they certainly intended to simplify their present method of charging for smalls.
Closing Small Stations
They were proposing to continue their pre-war policy of closing smaller stations and concentrate more on points using road facilities for collection and delivery. They would adopt a grid system of distancing, under which they would divide the country into appropriate zones.
The distancing problem, coupled with the sheer magnitude of the labour involved in calculating the millions of distances if every possible pair of terminals was to be covered, could best be surmounted by a system of charging zones. The common chargeable distances between each pair of zones would be calculated on a route principle to and from an important habitation near the centre of each zone.
Subject to a minimum distance, the railways proposed to charge the same classification scale rates from door to door, from any place in one zone to any place in another. Therefore there would always be available ready-made rates for consignments of varying size and every description of traffic between any two points in Great Britain, irrespective of how far they might be from a railway station.