The Speed of Pneumatic-tyred Buses.
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A TREMENDOUS amount of attention has been concentrated on one, in particular, of the recommendations of the Departmental Committee on the Taxation and Regulation of Road Vehicles, which is to the effect that heavy motorcars fitted with pneumatic tyres, and with an unladen weight not exceeding 3 tons 15 cwt. and a maximum axle weight of 4 tons, should be perthitted a maximum speed of 20 m.p.h. Many makers have endeavoured, in some cases successfully, to bring their vehicles within these limits, but the results of their experiences in this direction have proved in general that cutting down the weight of a single-deck bus of the 32-seater class, whilst allowing the production of vehicles suitable for city work, does not in all cases provide types entirely suited to provincial work, and yet speed is, if anything, more important in this latter class of work than in the other. In other words, it is very undesirable that pneumatic-tyred vehicles weighing more than 3 tons (but not exceeding 51 tons) should be definitely restricted to16 m.p.h., and there is an important paragraph. No. 124, in the report referred to above which should certainly be read in conjunction with the aforebentioned recommendation. This paragraph reads as follows :— " With regard to these recommendations the Committee are of opinion that the Minister should be empowered to authorize a greater speed than 16 miles per hour for heavy motorcars fitted with pneumatic tyres and exceeding 4 tons maximum /axle weight if and when he is satisfied that pneumatic tyres are available which would be adequate to stand such greater weight."
Surely at this stage of tyre development the Minister will have been satisfied that such tyres are actually available. Large fleets of vehicles exceeding by a fair amount the 3t tons are now either already equipped with such tyres or are being fitted with them, and this for routes covering difficult country in which safety combined with speed are essential factors to successful operation.
There is one very important point which must he considered when the question of cutting down weights is being dealt with. A bus may certainly have its seating accommodation limited to 32, but this does not by any means ensure that only this number of passengers will be carried, for crushhour transport is one of the greatest difficulties which have to be faced, and cases are not of infrequent occurrence in which buses may be loaded, practically to twice their rated capacity, and it would be a great hardship on the travelling public if, in country districts where the transport facilities are necessarily more restricted than in the more populous areas, this extra loading during peak periods could not be permitted. It is consequently essential in passenger vehicles used on such services to provide a high factor of safety which will suffice for all contingencies of this description. That this is being realized is shown by certain facts which have come to our notice in respect of orders for buses placed by certain municipalities which, whilst having every intention of running their vehicles at speeds up to 20 m.p.h., have practically ignored the recommendation for a limit of 31 tons, possibly in the hope that once the vehicles have been put into service, even if the recommendation passes into law, it will not be stringently enforced except in the case of newly licensed models. This, in our opinion, is not the correct way in which to look at the matter. However the law on the subject be modified, it is highly probable that such modifications will be carried into effect, and it is, therefore, essential that the opinions of users and makers should be thoroughly ventilated and formed into effective resistance so that pressure can be brought to bear upon the authorities beforehand. It is far easier to have a proposed law modified than to obtain changes in it once it is on the Statute Book.
Our Revised Tables of Operating Costs.
164. NOTABLE contribution to this Issue, for the accommodation of which, by the way, extra pages have been included, is a complete set of The Commercial Motor's Tables of Operating Costs, revised and entirely brought up to date as the outcome of recent alterations in the price of fuel and tyres. These tables are unique, for the sources of our information are special to this journal, and the principle upon which a fair balance is obtained, with a set of widely divergent basic facts, has only been arrived at as a result of the experience of years of collation and comparison. We hold that there is no difference between the operation of a transport undertaking and of any other business. Costs are actually not impossible to obtain. There may be many difficulties in the way, and many of the decisions and some of the classifications have necessarily to be quite arbitrary, but a close study of the subject is not only justified; it may be said to be vital to the wellbeing of any business concern. A set of accounts in connection with a transport undertaking, whether it is a business in itself or a department of a manufacturing or-trading concern, should be full, and :accurate, so framed as clearly to show running and operating costs, for only by means of such accounts can success be assured in fleet control. Without the figures thus provided the owner Is quite unaware whether =he is getting the best out of a vehicle or a fleet, he does not know whether It is working efficiently or economically, and he cannot even tell,,whether he is getting a fair and proper return from his employees. Our tables, used as a means of comparison with the results disclosed by such a set of accounts as that to which we have referred, will be a very valuable guide, and, to the man of limited experience In particular, the'tables showing the charges that should be made in order that a reasonable profit may be gained will be absolutely invaluable. We welcome the assistance of readers in the dissemination of the information contained in these tables, and shall continue our practice of reprinting and issuing the tables in pamphlet form. It may c14 interest our readers to know that the tables published a year ago circulated to the extent of 121,500 copies.
The Transport of Newspapers : An Opportunity for Hauliers.
(INE of the applications by the railway companies now before the Railway Rates Tribunal concerns an increase in the charges on parcels of newspapers, journals and magazines, and so sub stantial is the increase demanded, amounting on an average to quite 33* per cent., that the publish ing trade is -reconsidering the question of road transport in the light of the new figures. The contention of the railway companies is that the rates at present charged are unremunerative, and yet they find themselves faced with the fierce competition of mechanical road ,transport on certain sections of the newspaper traffic. In the transport of parcels _ of morning newspapers over distances exceeding, perhaps, 120 miles the factor of time enters into the question, and the railways would be able, in all probability, to hold that section of the traffic even at enhanced rates; but, where the distances are •within this limit, considerable traffic would be lost to mechanical road transport, whilst in the case of weekly journals, magazines and other literature, where the time available prior to publication is not cut so fine, the loss to the railways would be very substantial. Here is an opportunity which hauliers must not neglect. They should place themselves In touch with the publishing houses and should be in a position to quote for the services required, realizing that extreme reliability in timekeeping is an absolute essential of the business. Publishing houses and wholesale newsagents will have no Interest whatever in any service upon which they cannot rely.
This Is a branch of transport which is open to considerable extension. Up to certain distances from the printing establishments fast road transport has already quite monopolized the distribution of the evening papers and a proportion of the night traffic in newspaper parcels, and, as there is inevitable waste in the distribution of daily papers and some classes of the weekly and monthly publications, there is always a small amount of return load traffic to be taken -into account.
The Rejection of the Omnibuses Bill.
11" purpose of the Omnibuses Bill, introduced In the House of Commons on March 12th, was to simplify the procedure to be followed by a local authority which desires to run buses in addition to, or in substitution for, any tramway or other system. At present a local authority must incur the expense and delay of going to Parliament in order to obtain powers that will enable it to run buses and to carry services into adjoining areas or to run joint services with other authorities. For this procedure, slow and costly as it is, the Bill substituted an application to the Minister of Transport. There is a great deal to be said in favour of the Bill, for it would certainly have helped gradually towards the conversion of the public passenger services from the tramway to the bus system by giving local authorities the opportunity for readily extending their services by means of buses, the undoubted economy of which would eventually have served to demonstrate to the full the inefficiency, as a profit-earning proposition, of the tramway, its vulnerability to minor breakdown and its relative obstructiveness to other, traffic. The Bill was -rejected for many reasons, which are revealed by our Parliamentary correspondent in his notes this week.