Bus operators to take to rail?
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THE USE of British Rail tracks by trains run by private operators has been suggested by Professor David Starkie in a report issued by the Institute of Economic Affairs. There are precedents for it in the Orient Express and in the many privately owned freight wagons.
Whether BR would move out of the manger to let in private bus operators is another matter. Bus companies might be equally unenthusiastic about mixing With the railways.
In any event, the great attraction of the bus is its flexibility in operation, although there is a movement back to the rails in Manchester, where the Passenger Transport Executive is promoting a Parliamentary Bill to build just over two miles of tramway in the city centre. A similar scheme on a much bigger scale is being developed in East London.
Blackpool, last British bastion of the tram, has a handsome new single-decker that looks like a bus. It contrasts sharply with a lumbering double-decker built in Glasgow in 1948 and on loan to Blackpool for two years from the National Tramway Museum at Crich.