Social Consequences
Page 28
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
HARD commercial necessity, so much a factor in these days, may have driven from the minds of harassed users the fact that the operation of public service ,vehicles is a social activity. It is therefore rather refreshing to see that the authors of two of the three papers presented to the International Congress of the International Union of Public Transport at Edinburgh, this week, devoted some thought to this neglected question.
in his paper on "Urban Transport and City Planning" Mr. E. R. L. Fitzpayne, general manager of Glasgow Corporation transport department. was concerned wholly with this matter. Whilst he emphasized that town planning should endeavour to house people as near to their work as possible, his solution to the problem of moving large numbers of passengers during peak hours, involved the use of electric railed vehicles, either underground or on reserved surface tracks. This type of transport, apart from its economy— and if public transport became too expensive, said Mr. Fitzpayne, other means for transport would be found—had the advantage of offering a large overload capacity for peak-hour services.
The large capacity of what might be termed the Continental type of vehicle was referred to by M. A. Laparre and M. M. Cassan in their paper on fare systems and fare collection. High loading figures at certain times of the day and high average journey speeds led inevitably to the use of stationary conductors and eventually to the driver-conductor system, they believed. These developments had distinct disadvantages, not the least of which was that they resulted in less care being taken of the passengers. No assistance could be offered by the conductor if he were seated in a cubicle inside a bus out of sight of the entrance. The driver-conductor was even less able to help Moreover, if employees on vehicles operated by this system did not show the utmost tact, passengers became sensitive to the disagreeable and even imperious nature of the system, and did not use the services provided. In some cases, in order that the driver-conductor could cope with his dual job of fare-collxting and driving, it was necessary to penalize passengers who did not have the right fare ready or who had not bought their tickets before boarding the vehicle.
It is clear, in fact, that operators are in a difficult position. •To maintain solvency, they must increase vehicle loadings. This may be achieved by reducing the seating accommodation per vehicle, to permit more standing passengers. This, in turn, leads to the need for a stationary conductor, who may also be the driver. As the work becomes more difficult, this employee's pay must be increased. His standard of living, in fact, is raised, at the cost of lowering the standard of service offered to passengers. This may eventually lead to a loss of traffic. It may, in fact, be inferred that the social consequences of progress in public transport are indeed difficult to compromise, particularly where the law of diminishing returns is already applicable.