Off the Ground
Page 53
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UNLIKE certain public figures, municipal transport managers are not committed to wearing uniforms appropriate to the activity in which they are participating at any particular moment. If they conformed to any such rule Mr. G. G. Harding, head of Wallasey Corporation Transport, would be committed to a larger than average wardrobe. Mr. Harding's operating parish stretches to Liverpool in the one direction and might be regarded as extending to North Wales in the other. As he is responsible tor the corporation ferries he is sureIN, entitled to the appropriate nautical gad., —and he might lay claim to a flying kit as well.
His four vessels run all the year round from Liverpool to Seacombe and during the summer season between Liverpool and New Brighton. They also operate a series of day and evening cruises which even extend to Manchester by way ot the Ship Canal. To aid in these enterprises, the staff has recently been augmented by two part-time hostesses. Currently, Wallasey is toying with the idea of offering inclusive arrangements for coach travel from distant towns coupled with trips by the cruising vessels. Private hire work of this nature is performed by arrangement with Crosville Motor Services Ltd.
Mr. Harding did a good deal to assist British United Airways when they ran the experimental hovercraft service between Wallasey and Rhyl and he is currently at work on the construction of a 16-ft. personal hovercraft which may well be in operation in 1965. And at the centre of operations is the more mundane but extremely busy world of Wallasey Corporation buses, which provide an extensive service for the borough, with its six-figure population.