Passing Comments
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U.S. Road Needs
ABOUT 1.5m. new vehicles will be needed in the U.S.A. for road works in connection with the $33,100m. improvement plan covering the next 13 years. Most of this sum will be spent on the reconstruction of 41,000 miles of highway, for it is estimated that in 1975 the U.S.A. will have 20m. goods vehicles—about double the present figure.
Over three-quarters of the country's goods traffic is carried by road, and the current annual tonnage so transported is approximately 13,000m. In 20 years time it may well be 24,600m.
Whilst these figures reflect a planned advance in prosperity of almost unbelievable magnitude, on the sombre side is the forecast that if the present death rate on the roads-6.4 fatalities per 100m vehiclemiles—is not reduced, 53,000 people will be killed in 1966.
Hull's Road Transport Museum
ONE of the country's most unusual places of
interest is Hull Municipal Transport Museum, which is to reopen soon after being closed to the public because of war damage. It was started in 1923 by the director of Hull Museums and it has been rehabilitated by Mr. J. B. Fay, the present director and his staff.
Already many inquiries have been received about the date of reopening, which has not yet been fixed. It includes stage coaches, mail coaches and every facet of the road transport industry. There is Quicksilver, a stage mail coach which ran between A26 London and Devonport early in the 19th century at a fast clip of 10-11 m.p.h.
Among the vintage trams is England's oldest, found in the Isle of Wight. This example has a shapely roof and corner pillars carved with oak leaves and acorns. It ran between Portstewart and the Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland, and was built in Leeds in 1882. Next to it is a model of one of the last 'trams used at Hull and later bought by Leeds.
In addition to the commercial vehicles there. is a wide variety of carriages and cabs, cycles and vintage cars, including a 1901 steam-driven vehicle made in Paris.
Transport for an Overspill
AGREEAGREEMENT having been 'reached for Sodbury MENT District Council to accept " overspill " from Bristol, about 20,000 people will be accommodated at the west end of the village of Yate, close to the main railway from the Midlands to the West of England.
Yate at present is a small village, although it is the site of the large factory of Parnalls, whilst not far away is Newman Industries, another engineering firm.
• The creation of what will, in effect, be a new town within the next four, or five years will involve considerable changes in local transport. At the moment Yate has a half-hourly service to Bristol, augmented every two hours by the Bristol—Swindon service and at certain times by the through routes to Cirencester and to Stroud. The development will call for services off the main road and for purely local journeys.