TRAMS CAUSE LOSSES OF £10,000 A MONTH
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AN announcement by Mr. R. Stuart Filcher, transport manager of Manchester Corporation, that it is expected to abolish trams within 18 months, and that the chief difficulty is to train drivers to control buses, has been followed by interesting comments , from Councillor T. H. Adams, deputy chairman of the transport committee. It was foreshadowed, only a few weeks ago, that the change-over to buses was to come gradually in about three years. " Now there is a fight against time to save money," Mr. Adams remarked.
Until we get rid of trams we are losing £10,000 a month. Waiting for the council to decide to abandon trams cost us £60,060.
" The buses we are getting at the moment are replacements. We are held up because the Government is using so many factories, and we must wait for deliveries of buses. Of course, 350 buses is a big order for any concern ; it cannot be carried out in a day or a week.'
The committee aim, as usual, at giving as much of the work locally as possible. "Indeed," Mr. Adams added, "75 per cent. of the department's money is spent that way."
GLASGOW AND RECRUITING ADVERTISEMENTS.
BY eight votes to five, the transport committee of Glasgow Corporation last week turned down a recommendation from a sub-committee that recruiting advertisements should be displayed in trams in connection with the city's Balloon Barrage Corps.
Mr. William Reid, convener of the transport committee, said it should refuse to take any piecemeal advertisements until it had altered its decision on the general question of advertising on public-service vehicles. The corporation had already refused the sum of £30,000 yearly for advertisements on trams and buses.
BRADFORD ANTICIPATES A LOSS OF £13,705.
AN estimated loss of £13,705 on the working of Bradford Corporation Passenger Transport Department, during the financial year ending March 31 next, was indicated in figures submitted to the transport committee on Monday last. Net profit on trolleybuses was put at £4,635 and on motorbuses at £2,185, but these profits were more than counterbalanced by an estimated loss of £19,965 on the trams. Total income was put at £780,130, trading expenses at £683,130. gross profit at 297,000, and net revenue charges at £110,705.
Whilst the department's figures for the past year show a loss, the department's estimates for the coming financial year indicate an anticipated profit of £5,110, this figure being based largely on anticipated extra revenue from the further introduction of trolleybuses in place of trams, and the extension of motorbus operation.