Scotland Yard and the Motorcab.
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By 0. B. Serva.
People in the motorcab trade, both manufacturers and users, are beginning to wonder whether Scotland Yard really knows its own mind.'in regard to the motorcab regulations and their enforcement, and are asking who is the genius responsible for the regulation as regards measurements, equipment, etc., seeing that these regulations arc being chopped and changed about, till the poor cab builder and designer " dunno' Were 'e are." Who, for instance, in spite of the representations of the manufacturers that, in view of the 25-foot turning movement called for, it was largely impracticable, insisted upon retaining the call for a 32-inch distance between front springs? This pedantic regulation has now been altered, but not before a number of British manufacturers had been put to a lot of needless expense in the matter. When the first Renaults were brought over, it was found that the springs were much narrower than" this, but they were passed and allowed to run, although British constructors, who sought information on the subject of the Police requirements, were told that in future the regulations would be strictly adhered to.
' Experience with the authorities in connection with omnibuses had taught the manufacturers here that those entrusted with the passing of public-service vehicles were often veritable Martinets in regard to detail, so that those makers who were contemplating entering the cab-building business felt it was useless attempting to get cabs passed which did not, in the smallest particular, conform to the regulations, so there was apparently nothing for them to do—the representations of their representatives having failed—but to design closely to the regulations. They then found that, in order to get the 25-foot lock on their vehicles, it was not possible to build cars as they, as practical men, would have preferred to build them. In traffic, they naturally argued that, so long as a car was possessed of sufficient stability, a fairly narrow vehicle was more desirable than a wider one, as economising in read space and enabling the car to get through traffic openings the more readily, and, as they were already building their regular cars to a track of 4 feet 2 inches, or 4 feet 4 inches, without detriment, that these widths would be most desirable. But the 32-inch spring
width, with the 25-foot lock, could not be combined in a vehicle of this width. The Humber, Lotis, Argyll, and other British makers who cater for this trade had to redesign pretty well their entire vehicles, getting wheel-tracks of 4 feet 9 inches and 4 feet to inches as the result, and, when they had done all this work and gone to all this expense, la and behold! Scotland Yard issues a new set of regula tions, in which, instead of insisting on the French constructors building to their measurements, they had altered the regulations to suit the French specification and only called for 26 inches ! Now, why couldn't they have done this at first? And why couldn't they have notified British manufacturers of the alteration ? It would have saved some of 'them a lot of expense, and a lot of valuable time. The 32-inch rule, it is understood, was insisted on to • secure stability, and the alteration has probably been made because experience with the Renault .cabs has shown that, as the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders urged, only officialdom wouldn't listen to it, the stability was sufficient with the narrower and more practicable figuring. It is true that the British makers have now got vehicles with greater stability than their foreign rivals, but what is good • enough for the foreigner should be good enough for us, for the customer will most certainly not consider this greater .stability as an argument in buying, if all other considerations are equal.
Then there is another matter, which seems all very absurd and affects everyone alike, though perhaps rougher on the 'user than on the manufacturer. The " Yard " people duly 'passed and licensed the cabs, as we see them on the streets to-day, with a fold-down emergency seat in front, inside, and with the driver's seat running the full width of the -cab; yet, when the unfortunate motor cabman occupies either of these seats with a "fare," down comes Scotland Yard on his head like a hundred of bricks, and runs him in for taking more than the two passengers he is licensed to carry. Why this thusness, the cab owners want to know. Why license a cab with these extra seats, if no one is to be allowed to sit on them? Where is the reason in the action either? It is no uncommon sight to see three people crowded into a hansom, and I have no doubt everyone of us has "been there" before now; nor is it an unknown thing to see someone sitting beside the driver of a "growler." Where there is ei horse in question, a case of overloading and consequent cruelty to animals may arise, which has no bearing when a motorcar is the conveying agent, especially when that car has the power in it which is considered necessary, or desirable, for cab work. Why make fish of one and fowl of another, and why not license a vehicle to carry the number of passengers its constructors have designed it to carry ? I understand the powers that be are now withdrawing the licenses of a number of the Renault cabs, till they have had the shoddy cloth linings with which they are fitted taken out and retrimmed in leather, and a regulation is, I am told, now in force, calling for leather upholstery in all cabs submitted. There is nothing much to object to in this, save that it has not been done before, and that, from the General Motorcab Company's point of view no doubt, cabs should have been passed at all with a trimming which would not be permanently accepted. In stipulating for leather, the authorities are doing quite the right thing. It is what British coachbuilders who know their business have been urging all along. They knew perfectly well that cloth linings and cheap cloth linings like the French constructors. were fitting in particular, would harbour dust, and dirt, and microbes, and would soon wear shabby, and they offered their customers something much more suitable, and much more durable, although, in the nature of things, more expensive. But Scotland Yard had passed the cloth linings, and the French bodybuilders, quoting on that, were able to undersell their British rivals, and cab buyers, in many cases, knowing little, and caring less, about anything save first cost, accepted the lower quotations of the French houses for an inferior article, on the principle that what was good enough for Scotland Yard was good enough for them, and so a considerable amount of trade has been lost to the British coachbuilder, this past year, which would probably have been retained for us, had the" Yard "been a little more practical in its ideas. It is admitted that the object of the regulations is to secure the safety and comfort of the travel ling public, and in this particular instance it would have been better and less misleading to the cab trade had the opinion of some practical man on the subject been consulted. Finally, there is another matter which, just now, is a considerable worry to the manufacturers, and that is the powers which the authorities reserve to themselves, and occasionally exercise, to refuse to pass vehicles for reasons which find no place in the regulations at all. Many of those reasons, when they are made apparent by refusals, are con sidered by the cab trade to he often arbitrary, and of a purely personal character as regards the individual entrusted with the work, and what the makers not unreasonably ask is that, if they comply with the printed regulations, their vehicles shall be passed. At present, they may work with the regu lations in front of them, get every detail right in accord ance therewith, and yet have no reasonable assurance that their cabs will pass muster. Seeing that a refusal for some trivial and hitherto unheard of objection may cost the maker
a good many golden sovereigns, especially if his headquarters are other than in London, makers feel that they are, to an extent, working in the dark, and are not in all cases—at least so the feeling is– beingtreated altogether fairly. The difficulties of the position in the motor trade to-day are quite
enough, without having too much red tape wound round about it.