• SIR HENRY MAYBVRY ON ROADS."'
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Their Great Value and the Obvious Development of Traffic Upon Them.
T' . 1--1B FIRST MEETING of the. Institute of Transport, held at the Institution of Civil Engineers, . on Monday of last week, was exceptionally well attended, the chair being occupied :by Sir Maurice Fitzrnaurice1 and a paper being read by Sir Henry P. MayburY, K.C.M.G., C.B., on " Reads---a
Review and Forecast." .
,Sir Henry said that. it is appropriate that this subject should come before the Institute in this stirring ePoeh of reconstruction, when, thanks to the establishment of the Ministry of Transport, ,the advantage of a central organization has come into being which can renew the original impulse given to road-making by our great constructive forerunners of the Roman Empire. He dealt briefly with the history of roads front the _period of the Roman invasion onwards, and showed. how the responsibility for the repair of highways had gradually shifted 'until it came into the hands Of the various-local authorities, who met the expense of construction and maintenance by means of a highway rate levied upon the inhabitants. In general, the scheme of highway administration has had for its basis for many centuries the parish as its unite and thin has had a. cramping effect on iced construction and restricted the range of vision. Its (autonomy has been quite parochial, as is perhaps diseernible in the veto still in vogue,. which enables the smallest-local authority to bar the passage of a tramway through their area, however pressing may he the needs of the larger community surrounding them.
The Local Government Act of 188 placed all main roads and their bridges, in charge of the county counicilS, and two important milestones on the road of progress • have been (1) the creation of the Road Board, in 1909, involving the recognition of the necessity. of aenational responsibility for road communications,. and (2) the creation of the Ministry of Transport, in 1919, which emphasizes and extends that national responsibility am/ provides a fuller means Whereby a national highway policy can be framed and pursued. ,
The present mileage of roads repaired by local 'authoritiei in the United kingdOm has been computed at 234,000 miles, or ten times the length of the railway system of the United kingdom, which is calculated at 23,420 miles. He endeavoured' to assess the value of this network of .highways, avoiding over:. capitalization. Taking the :land. they. acicupy, he arrived at a total area of .680,720 acres; and 'taking the value at the 16w figure' Of £33 per acre, . arrived at a total value of 222;500,000. 'raking the value of construction' at 10s.: per yard 'super, which is quite a low figure, arid nutting down the width of carriage way at only 12 ft., he gave the valuation of this at £824,000,000; adding the value orbridges, he brought up the total value Of the roads to £900,000,000, or quite two-thirds ef the capital' (21,349,000,000) which Is invested in the railways of the United Kingdom.
The cost of road maintenance in England and Wales for 1914-1915, the last year far which really representative particulars are available,, was, roughly, £17,500,000, which is equivalent to approximately 9s. 9d. per head of the. population per -annuli'', or onethird of a penny per 'day, and he ventured to doubt whether, for any other Tqually small expenditure, the public reaps so large 'a benefit in business,
pleasure, or exerci.S, , .
He put thei number of motor vehicles dn the roads . of the United Kingdord at 733,828 (figures which have 014 . eViciently been obtained from the same sourceas those employed by the committee that has just concluded its la.bours on taxation), and he estimated the number of horsed vehicles at 235,000, thus giving nearly a million: vehicles of all classes on the roads, quite apart from bicycles.
Sir Henry gave some very interesting particulars from the Report of the London Traffic Branch of the Board of Trade showing that the tendency is for the percentage of theenumber of passengers carried by public-service conveyances to increase. In 1909, 60 per cent, were coth=ey.ed by read and 40 per cent, by rail; yearly, the former figure inereased and the Ihtter decreased, until, in 1913, 68 per cent, were carried by road and 32 per cent, by rail. The activities of the motor industry of this country contemplated a big output, so that these figures would-suggest that the use of the roads will develop to an enormous extent.
He dealt with the need for new arterial 'roads and for careful supervision of all town-planning, with proper safeguarding of roads across undeveloped land by means of town-planning resolutions passed by iqeal authorities. 'A hopeful sign of the present time is for the tendency of local authorities to group themselves into joint committees for the purpose of town, planning, thirS creating, a u,pit capable of taking a wide view, . framing a.coMprehensiye. policy, and taking account of the general needs of through traffic.
He dealt with, the present inadequacy of communications in the docks district of London, and suggested that remedies. of a drastic and sweeping nature are necessary. He went on to deal' with the Classification of roads now being undertaken by the Ministry of Transpor4, and he laid down what he 'considered to be the standard of road which 4 modern motor traffic imposes.
A most interesting contribution to the.. diseussion was that of Mr. E. S. Shrapnell-Smith, C.B.E., Who placed the figures for mileage and value of roads of this country higher than hadbeen placed by the author of the paper. He gave it as his opinion that, including private and occupation roads, the total was 300,000 miles, and assessing this at the low figure of £5,000 per mite, the total value came to £1,500,000,000.
He dealt with the increasing, uSe of commercial vehicles in conjunction with. railways radiating from trans-shipment stations, and held that this was to the good, because it made for the improvement of railway, efficiency, for economy in despatch, and for the advantage of the.receiver of the goodEi.
He also dealt with the shortage of warehouse aceommodatien in the vicinity, of the docks, and stated that he thought. it, would be 'necessary to construct rings of warehouses .seven to eight miles out, or further, so as' to relieve those. 'Warehouses which are near the quays, motor vehicles doing the inter• mediate work.
With regard to road classification, heasked Sir Henry Ma..ybury for an assurance that heavy vehicles would not be forbidden to go on roads which are included in Class 3; should they he -so forbidden, trans-shipment of all goods to lighter vehicles at the junction of all Class 3 roads with roads of a higher category would be necessary.
In his reply, Sir Henry Maybury said that all road's of the country, unless they were closed by special order, must be open to all vehicles at all times, so long as the user is reasonable and does not impose upon the roads extraordinary traffic.