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bird's eye
Page 67
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view by the Hawk • Champagne party Flying past NCL headquarters in John Street in London was hazardous even for old birds like the Hawk this week. With all the explosions going on I thought they were shooting the accountants but, praise be, it was the champagne corks shooting off the bottles. For the first time everthe accountants were declaring that NCL had made aprofit on its October trading. Yes, that's right, a profit. The news is even more startling when one realizes that the "yellow perils" are in the habit of losing over E2m per month. Well done, lads! Sorry, I couldn't join you in the "champers", but then I wasn't supposed to know you had made a profit, was I?
• 0-m-o and all that jazz
First the good news: "The extension of one-man operation in 1970/71", reports the transport manager to Gelligaer UDC, "has now been fully accepted by the travelling public and is working well."
Now the had news: "One side effect of this, however, has been an increase in the degree of vandalism to fittings and fixtures of the vehicles."
Unlucky for some news: "To replace slashed seats it is costing between £50-£60 per month which obviously must be passed on to the travelling public by way of fare charges."
But there's hopeful news: "(Experiments are taking place in the self manufacture of fibreglass and poly-propolyne seating)".
Wait for it news: "No further extension of o-m-o has been possible because of the rufusal by the local trade union to agree to operate joint routes o-m-o until all operators on the routes do likewise."
The undertaking just broke even for the year ended March 31 and the utilization of vehicles and crews at off-peak and weekend periods for an extension of private hire work has increased —"particularly throughout the summer months with the varying activities of jazz band competitions in South Wales."
II Oh, Mr Porter!
These railwaymen have no shame, have they? The CIT's new president, David McKenna, is a British Railways Board member and there he was at the Institute's anniversary luncheon last week blatantly publicizing the railways. Calling for the attention of the huge gathering of transport men, he announced that two unused return tickets between Crewe and London had been found. And asked for the "clever and sensible" traveller to come and collect them! With Mr Peyton busy at the Battle of Brussels, a DoE Under-Secretary, Mr Eyre, did a valiant stand-in job of denying the validity of newspaper stories about chopping the railways — though he did admit that both BR and the Government were "concerned about the financial position of the railways", and were looking hard at long-term alternative plans.
There was a distinct murmur of approval when he forecast that there would be increasing opportunities for members of the CIT to become involved in the formulation of transport plans — but I wonder just what that means? The day that operational wisdom really takes over from politics I shall be seen eating my hat (or would be, if I owned one).
• No idyll
When shall we be able to write the following of Britain, I wonder? "A first-class, highcapacity road network . . excellently surfaced, uncongested highways perfectly geared to the swift movement of freight of all kinds between the ports, the cities and towns, the industrial centres — and indeed the farms and villages. They are more than adequate to meet all the demands upon them now and, when the programme of motorway construction is completed, the foreseeable future."
Utopian? Well, not quite, because the description is of Ulster. But, the present terrible troubles apart, there's no doubt that Northern Ireland is now an almost textbook example of an economy built on road transport — no scheduled internal air freight and hardly any railways left.
The quotation about roads comes from a very attractive new colour brochure aimed by Northern Ireland Carriers Ltd at its customers — and potential customers; and very appealing too.
• Scottish invasion
Every time one of those big, smart Christian Sahesen fridge artics passed me I used to make a mental note to find outjust how long that Scandinavian-sounding company had been in Britain. I found out quite by chance last week, when talking to Stewart Duff about the southward spread of Transfieet Services, of Stirling. Stewart is managing director — but the Salvesen company is holder of a third of the shares.
It turns out that Christian Salvesen's Scottish transport operations (originally in shipping) date from 1853, the year in which the Norwegian of that name took over the business set up by his elder brother in Leith in 1846.
Stewart was telling me how his own company's operations are spreading south of the border hiring out vehicles, financing their use, providing contract maintenance and so on. He thinks the essence is purposebuilt premises, and the first of these at Glasgow is now being added to: the leased depot at Birtley is being replaced by a newone in September next year, and before that there'll be another in Leeds.
More are planned for the Midlands and the south but it is the price of land which helps to determine where they'll be — and also makes one draw breath rather sharply. Urban land at £12,000 an acre is not hard to find in Scotland and the north, but in the Midlands one is lucky to get the equivalent site for £.30,000. As for London, well. . . .
• Euro example
The thought that we've all got to start behaving and thinking like good Europeans instead of insular Britons in just over a month's time reminds me keenly of the late Nicolas-Leon Erpelding, technical editor of a French contemporary transport journal Le Poids Lourd. As a European — not the Frenchman that most people assumed him to be — he was a good model.
In the first place he shamed us by speaking fluent English and German as well as his native tongue; and we listened willingly because his journal (like CM) is highly regarded, and he was a great innovator. Then, too, he was born in Luxembourg, studied in Belgium and made his career in France — a lesson in mobility that our children will learn very easily. And in his writing, teaching and membership of technical bodies he always took a very international point of view.
• Silent resistance
If Nicolas-Leon's surname rings a bell (sorry!) with some readers, perhaps it is because his first association was with his uncle's production of the Erpelding bicycle, which was apparently highly prized in the home of the Tour de France.
He later used his inventiveness in the service of his adopted country. He was chief engineer of the Dodge concessionaires in Lyons in 1940, and during the Occupation he exploited his technical skill to devise ingenious ways of delaying vehicles under repair for the Germans; but when the Liberation came he was able to rustle up a whole fleet of vehicles for the Resistance within 10 days — complete with sets of the spares which had been so mysteriously unavailable before.
The Hawk's thought for the week: Don't sack him because of the last trivial lapse which upset you.