THE PARIS BUS (STEM REBUILT
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ZOM NOTHING By L. Graham Davies
Continental Representative of The Commercial Motor"
FUSION of the Paris municipal bus undertaking, known as the S.T.C.R.P. (Societe. des Transports en Commun dans la Region Parisienne), with the Metropolitan Railway, had been arranged before the outbreak of war, but did not take place until January, 1942, when France was under German occupation and the familiar Paris bus had almost disappeared. The combined organization, styled La Regie Autonome des Transports Parisiens, had a rough period during the enemy occupation, and its surface transport side is only now beginning to revive.
In 1939, the Paris bus fleet included rather more than 3,500 vehicles, but after the fallrof Paris, the Germans took 2,000 of these buses, and of the remaining 1,500, several hundred were wrecked in their garages by Resistence men amongst the S.T.C.R.P. staff. Eventually, only some 350 vehicles remained in service, and these were used on suburban lines. They were operated with extreme difficulty, because of the complete lack of petrol or tyres. Many ran on town gas or producer gas.
Fortunately for Parisians, their city is exceptionally well served by its underground network, extensions to which continued steadily even under enemy occupation. The Metro still carries the bulk of public passenger transport, although not without inconvenience to the passengers, for trains are shockingly overcrowded at peak hours, and Parisians long for the good old city bus services, Which were most efficient. Many city lines have beet' restarted, but concentration of effort is for the time being on the suburbs.
Fleet Restored to 2,250 Vehicles Immediately after the liberation, the Regie Autonome established .a reconstruction plan for surface transport, designed to get at least 1,500 buses on the road again by the end of 1946. The first thing was to retrieve, if possible, some of the vehicles taken away by the enemy. By a systematic search, 1,230 buses were discovered and brought back from Belgium, Holland, Germany and even Austria. Naturally, they were in poor condition, but, after repair, these vehicles enabled many of the suburban routes to be restored, if only partially.
After four years' work, the fleet has grown again to 2,250 vehicles, a large proportion being used in the suburbs to which the Metro does not extend. Last year, 900,000,000 passengers were carried.
Reconditioning the salvaged buses was a labour of Hercules, for many had to be practically rebuilt and the central repair depot had been two-thirds destroyed by bombing in 1944. Only 10 depots out of 26 remained in service, the rest having been requisitioned or turned over to other purposes.
To-day, the Paris bus fleet is well .on the way to complete re-establishment. Suburban routes are operating efficiently, whilst in the city itself, new s buses are constantly coming into service. The consistent and unremitting effort that this has entailed can be appreciated only by those who have spent much time in France since the war. Spare parts and machine tools were completely lacking when peace arrived, all the useful ones having been removed by the enemy.
Apart from the oil-engined coaches now coming into use on relatively long suburban routes, Paris buses still use the traditional fuel, a mixture of commercial alcohol, benzol and petrol, which gave its characteristic, but not unpleasant, odour to the streets of the city. The Regie B8 Autonome has, however, adopted the trolleybus for certain suburban routes and has achieved considerable success.
Fifty of these Vetra trolleybuses are now in service on two routes to the west of Paris. They are comfortable, well-equipped vehicles carrying 55 seated passengers and, in theory, another 30 straphangers. The nominal standing capacity is always exceeded at peak hours on Paris buses.
The Vetra trolleybus has a 100 h.p. motor with an average current consumption of 1,200 kw per 100 kilorns., operational voltage being from 450 to 650.
On the trolleybus routes, 'experiments have for some time been conducted with a " mixed " type of steelaluminium overhead cable designed to reduce wear beneath suspension points.
Among prototype buses in experimental service are four with light-alloy bodies, based on the Renault T.N. 411 pre-war chassis, which has a four-cylindered 5.9-litre petrol engine. The bodies have been constructed from prefabricated components, supplied by the Societe des Prototypes de Carrosseries Legeres, of Amboise. The body frame is built up in A.G.5 pressings, spot-welded, and the outer panels, of 12/10 mm. A.G.3 sheet, are detachable.
Suburban Routes have Priority Present-day conditions have led the Regie Autonorne to re-plan its surface transport, and for the moment suburban routes have priority. As far as the city is concerned, attention has been given to the few districts not well served by the Metro, and to linking up terminal points of the Metro on the fringe of the city by peripheral bus services. Beyond these another ring of services connects up with bus lines running into the outer suburbs. For these longer suburban routes, prototype coaches, such as the 70-passenger Chausson and the new oil-engined S.O.M.U.A., have been introduced.
The old rear platform for standing passengers, beloved of Parisians because they could smoke on it, still exists on the new vehicles, but it has been enclosed, and a side, instead of a rear, entrance is arranged. In all the
latest prototypes, however, there are front and rear doors to maintain one-way movement when pas sengers are entering or alighting.
The new S.O.M.U.A. bus for suburban work is
a fine vehicle. This has a six-eylindered engine of 8.55 litres, delivering 120 b.h.p. at 2,000 r.p.m. The transmission line includes a hydraulic clutch and Cotal electro-magnetic epieyclic gearbox, with a switch control on the steering wheel.
Another 50 trolleybuses are on order from the Vetra Co., the model selected being a slightly modified version of those already in service. This has a motor of 130 h.p., instead of 100 h.p., and the power group is located beneath the driving cab, instead of at the rear, to give more seating space. Under full load, the vehicle has a maximum speed of about 36 m.p.h. Of the 26 bus garages existing before the war, 17 are now in operation again, the average maintenance staff employed in them being 85 men per 100 vehicles. Complete general overhauls are made in a central depot, damaged in the war, but now largely rebuilt. When, in B9
the near future, this depot is in full operation, the time required for a complete overhaul will be ,about nine days, resulting in an output of eight reconditioned buses per day.
Inspection is carried out in the garages. A general examination takes place every 20,000 kilorns.,,a partial inspection every 5,000 kiloms., greasing every 2,000 kiloms., and minor inspections for small adjustments, etc., every 1,250 kiloms.
There are at present 413 bus routes in operation, 38 in Paris proper and the remaining 75 in the suburbs, the number of vehicle-kitoms. run annually being over 100,000,000. Suburban lines all terminate within' 20-kilom. radius of Notre Dame cathedral, their tot length at the moment being 341 kiloms.
At all bus termini and at important stopping point the queue system of regulating passenger traffic employed, as in Britain, but at other stops, th traditional Paris system of numbered tickets is retainet Instead of forming a queue, passengers draw numbere tickets from an automatic machine. When a bus arrive the conductor calls out the numbers until the bus is ful On the whole, this system appears to operate in satisfactory manner.,