. THE PIPER AND THE TUNE.
Page 26
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By "The Inspector."' MANY of vs. had hoped that, by the end of 1920, at last road users would have been placed in a position that would have enabled them to have secured for themselves a comprehensive idea of the laws of this .country as they obtain with regard to road users, the roads they run, and the vehicles they use on them. The whole position has long wanted clearing up, and at the time of writing we are still, of course, some way from this.
Apparently, delay in this task of consolidation may be assumed to have been principally due to various complications that arose as the result of the provisions of the Finance Act of 1920, which, it will be recalled, brought with it very considerable alterations in the scales of excise duties for motor vehicles. The new scales necessitated revised definitions and classifications, which matched very poorly 'with the 'existing Motor Car Acts.
All that has been done to date, therefore, is to pass into law the limited Road Act of 1920, which, it will be remembered, was pushed through Parliament at express speed. That, of course, does not finish the matter. A great deal of discussion and drafting has yet to be done in order to consolidate the whole ' position and to leave us road users with a, clean-cut schedule of responsibilities, financial and legal and if the lawyers permit it, a more or less intelligible statement of what may or may not be done in regard to the use of mechanically propelled vehicles on common roads. It is almost too much to expect that we shall get the position cleared up to that extent, as few of us, truth to tell, have faith enough in the many lawyers who have a hand in the drafting of these regulations to anticipate that we shall be left with a schedule of enactments that will clarify the position to everybody's advantage--excepting the lawyers'. And, of course, I must be fair and not forget that the laws concerning the use of the highways run into many volumes, so that their codification will be. a colossal job. * * * The most discussed alterations, or at any rate those which will have most significance for the road user, of course, will affect the classification of vehicles according to their operating weights. Opinions are many and varied as ta thediraits of weight, which should be made to correspond with the accepted limits of speed. A great many of the opinions that have been voiced in the Press and in public speeches have emanated from those who are not, at any rate to any particular extent, contributors to the cost of road making and maintenance. It seems to the writer that the people who use the roads. are the people who can confidently he left to suggest 'what are the safe axle weights to link with the safe .naximuin legal speeds—subject, of course, to very full consideration of the subject being given by those authorities who are concerned with public, safety, and providing that sufficient, safeguards are embodied to eliminate risk to life and limb of the foot passenger, and of all other users of the highway, bearing in mind, too, the maintenance of the general amenities of the roads, and the convenience of those who live near to them. * * * After all, it is a very good old maxim ; the one that says that those who pay the piper have every right to call the tune. The motor user is, in future, to pay for the costs of the roads. Providing that he is so restricted from using them that he is no nuisance to his fellow users, whether they employ their own shanks' ponies or one of the rapidly shrinking total 030
of horse-drawn. vehicles, or other mechanically propelled machines, and that, generally speaking, he behaves himself as a respectable member a the community, it should largely be left to him to decide what axle weights. will do least -damage to the roads —in other words, what will cost him least.
This long-drawn-out discussion as to what are the safe and proper axle weights that may be permitted at .certain speeds, is very largely due to a desire to ensure the fixing of such relative weights and speeds as shall do as little damage to the roads as may be The inter-related questions of axle weights and road speeds have to be considered with regard to the ultimate effect they will have upon the maintenance and upkeep of first-class highways.
Surely, therefore, those bodies of users who will ultimately, through their properly constituted associaticyns and their own technical experts, be bound by the law as it will be enacted, are those who should be heard particularly and. With the greatest consideration, as they will be the ones to pay at any rate the major portion of the east of upkeep of the highways. If their considered decisions and recommendations are to the effect that, questions of public safety and public amenities apart, certain speeds and certain axle weights may he properly combined with minimum effects on the road, they will be the people who will most suffer if they have put forward axle weights that are too high or speeds that are excessive for such weights. They will be the ones who will suffer from bad road surfaces, and from the consequent destructive effects upon. their own property when in isse. They will be the people who will see that their own tremendous contributions to the road maintenance funds of the country will be more or less wasted, because, owing to the excessive weights and Speeds, they will have nullified what was expected to be the good effect of very generous expenditure on road construction on proper lines and maintenance, thereafter, in first-class condition.
Recommendations that are based on erroneous conceptions of the ill-effects of weights and speeds on road surfaces will come back on the road user as on no one else. It would, therefore, appear that he is the man, properly -and technically advised, who can best make effective recommendations as to what is to be the inter-relation of speed and weight ; and it would be well if the public at large were more clearly informed as to his vested interest. in the roads. It would he well if the general public realized that the properly constituted controlling bodies of road users of all classes are people who, for their own ends if for no other reasons, are concerned in making recommendations that must be sound ones.
The writer feels convinced that the right and proper people who can safely be left to say at what speed a 32-seater loaded char-&-bancs can safely be allowed to proceed is that person or persons who represents or represent the collective views of road users throughout the country, And so with all other classes of mechanically propelled vehicles which are -ultimately to be scheduled on the new basis that will be contained in the new Roads Act of the immediate future, so far, at any rate, as road surfaces and road maintenance charges are concerned. The user, more than anybody, is the man concerned with the provision of first-class surfaces; it is part of his bread and butter, just as much as the provision of excellent permanent way ma,kes all the difference between profit and loss on running any railway organization.