How. Long Must We Wait ?
Page 22
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THE decision which was recently made by London Transport in connection with the eventual replacement of the remaining trams by oil-engined buses,' and not trolley-buses, as was envisaged, may possibly mean that the out-of-date tram will remain with us longer than some people have expected.
So long as the trams be allowed to run, so will the roads on which the tracks are laid be permitted to deteriorate. Piece-meal efforts arc being made to patch up short stretches, but, taking the tramway network as a whole, it can be said that the tracks and the adjacent road surface are in a deplorable condition.
The amount of destruction to tyres caused by lines which, in many areas, have become worn almost to knife edges, can be on a par only with the shattering to which the whole of the vehicle is being continuously subjected when negotiating the hills and valleys by which the lines are bordered.
Have we to await the day when there are suCicient buses available before we say good-bye to the trams? If this be so, then something ought to be done now about the tram tracks. We do, of course, appreciate that it would be most uneconomical to undertake large-scale road repairs at this juncture, were it but a few months before the last tram is to run, but as it may well be several years and not months, repairs by the yard are not good enough.
As even the smallest road repair causes traffic hold-ups, why is it that we seldom see any activity after the hours of daylight? Surely, the importance of keeping traffic flowing smoothly, without having to make wide detours which cost time and money. is just as important in peace as in war?
The interminable time taken to effect repairs on quite insignificant stretches of road would certainly not have been tolerated during the war if it had meant a hold-up to the transport by road of essential goods or material. Now, when the volume of traffic is many times as great as during the war years, one sees a few nonchalant souls settle down on a strip of road for days if not weeks on end.