Charge for Police Escorts ?
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NEW legislation giving local authorities power to charge for police escorts required to conduct abnormally wide or long loads is sought by the police committee of the 'County Councils Association. They also propose that provision of escorts for abnormal loads should be obligatory.
An official said the question was first raised by Worcestershire County Council, who were worried at the increasing number of loads being moved by road.
The council, he said, expressed the view that industrialists, in weighing up whether it was cheaper to send goods by road, rail or sea, should have to face " fairly and squarely " the extra costs involved in providing police escorts for road vehicles.
The association's highways committee are backing the police committee in their demand for new legislation and are themselves seeking a revised form of indemnity to extend to damage caused to roadside verges by other vehicles being obliged to leave the carriageway to enable abnormal indivisible loads to pass.
300,000 MILES SAVED
FURTHER reductions in mileage amounting to about 300,000 a year were made in 1958 by the West Riding Automobile Co., Ltd., Sir Ronald G. Leon, chairman, reported to the shareholders last Friday. Permanent economies had been effected.
Maintenance charges were reduced through the acquisition of 45 new buses in 1957. The price of tyres had dropped and the general level of prices of other supplies had remained fairly constant, but the continual fluctuation in the cost of fuel made it almost impossible accurately to forecast the result of future operations. The rateable value of properties had been practically doubled.