Railway Companies' MotorvanE.
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Several of our great railway companies have comfit< ted
modest experiments with self-propelled vehicles. 'I he Lancashire and Yorkshire Company, after the Liverpool Trials, was one of the first to make tests, and that example was discoimectedly followed by the :Midland and Great Western Companies_ The natural disinclination to supersede their own methods ot inter-nrhan transport ransvo the goods managers to put the i-ellicles and tractors ii sin short-distance town work, in competition with horses, without mueh selection, and in this there is as no satisfaction; the performances secured, largely owing to the unavoidable delays, were too small. We do not say that economies were not sometimes obtained over daily aa.gregates as low as 20 miles. but this was the exception, and dependent upon heavy hut Is of urgent consignment, such as fish to the central markets. An exception from purely local conveyance arose at Nth, where the Midland Company used steam wagons to serve foreign " points seven and more miles away. This 'musical plan of action, whicii. so far as we were able to aseertain at the time, was forced upon that company by a peculiar and prolonged shortage of water in a canal along which its traffic for the places in cluestion had gone aforetime, was not a success: the road authorities Isere prompted to oppose it, nod to press cliims for extraordinary-traffic damage. It nia:kiii short. be recorded that the several great companies have experienced bona-fide disappointment in the majority of their attempts to introduce motor goods vehicles.
There has, more recently, been a measure of concentration upon the problem of the van for loads of from 15 to 25ewt. The Great Western Clompanv, to quote one ease, gave close attention, first at Slough and then in the Metropolis, to the accumulator-driven van, with a singlebattery range of seine 26-28 iwilea. hut we have reason to believe that the conclusions reciehed are unfavourable to the further construction or purchase of this type. Again with some six years of observation and records before it in regard to 30-cwt., petrol-driven, rubber-tired vans, and with full cognisance of the experiences with electric vans in America, the Midland Company, about a year ago, added to its stock with internal-combustion equipment, these orders being directly traceable to the It.A.C. competition of September-October, 1907. It is not surprising, in these circumstances, to learn that one big company has recently set in motion its programme for the gradual acquirement of several hundred petrol vans, and it is only a question of time now—at the most two or three years—before we shall see other companies '' tumbling over one another " to bring themselves up to date in a like sense. The industry will not be sorry to witness the change and to benefit by the impetus which will then he given to trade all round. The decision to go ahead is proof that the 15-cwt. motorvan can to-day be worked at least as cheaply as the average horse van, in spite of delays over collection and delivery, for certain jobs. We shmill expect, none the less, that the motors will be preferentially employed upon work between town receivingbranches and the goods depots or terminal railwaystations, and in the conveyance of selected consignments other than " smalls " for separate distribution.