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UGGESTED BY MR. DRAVERS

20th November 1964
Page 45
Page 45, 20th November 1964 — UGGESTED BY MR. DRAVERS
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been appointed, Mr. Dravers continued, and whilst, unfortunately, Mr. Fraser could not be present at the dinner, he would like to express to hint the good wishes of the industry for a successful tenure of his exacting office.

Turning to the problem of urban traffic, Mr. Dravers said that there was often scope outside London for improving traffic flow by simple traffic management devices. Bus operators were the most economical users of road space, but local authorities in the provinces and Scotland were sometimes slow to recognize the relief to their traffic problem which buses would be able to give them if journey times could sensibly be speeded up. In fact, he said, their progress was impeded by thousands of cars—all too many of them non-essential---so that timetables suffered and people got fed up with sitting in almost stationary buses, determining henceforth to take out their own cars because they thought they could do better.

Mr. Dravers asked where the fault lay for the growing congestion outside London. Were there too many highway authorities, some willing to tackle the problem one way, some another. and some perhaps unwilling to tackle the problem at all? He was encouraged to ask these questions because some years ago Mr. Marples had thought it necessary to take over from the Metropolitan boroughs the control of traffic flow in the London area and there was no doubt that the measures he introduced, though by no means popular with everyone, resulted in a speeding up of traffic which it would not otherwise have been possible to achieve in the time.

Rural buses continued to he a problem, Mr. Dravers continued. not only to the providers and users of them, but also those authorities currently engaged in inquiries to see what could be done to improve communications in certain selected areas. It should not be forgotten that the rural bus services of these islands were a good deal better than one found on the Continent of Europe or North America, and there was a danger that measures designed to help the country dwellers might, by weakening existing facilities, have quite the opposite to the desired effect. What rural buses needed, he said, was to be strengthened, and this led naturally to fuel tax, the abolition of which—for rural and all other services---would be the biggest shot in the arm they could have. •

Tags

Organisations: US Federal Reserve
People: Fraser
Locations: London

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