Reserved Decision on Blackpool Tours
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WHEN members of the Shropshire VV Omnibus Association presented a series of applications for excursions and tours before the West Midland Traffic Commissioners at Birmingham last week, the only contested case was a three-day Blackpool illuminations tour application by H. Brown and Sons. It was opposed by Smith's Eagle Coachways Ltd., who sought exclusive operation of the tour. Brown, however, did not cross-object to Smith's application, taking the view that the two firms served two distinct catchment areas and had only seven common. picking-up points.
Smith's associated company, A. L Jones and Co. Ltd., also sought to run the three-day Blackpool tour, but announced they would not press their application if Smith's were granted exclusive operation. Applications by several other Shropshire operators to run similar tours were withdrawn. The Commissioners reserved their decision on all the Blackpool three-day applications.
Giving evidence, Mr. H. T. Smith, a director of both Smith's Eagle and A. L. Jones. said he operated day tours to Blackpool on an average of eight times a year before the illuminations•and three or four times a year during the illuminations; a seven-day tour to the resort was also operated.
Summing up the case for Smith's Mr. Kenneth Mynett said his clients and Brown were agreed there was a public need for the tour in question. The only matter at issue was who should operate it. Smith's felt they were best equipped to do it because they were the established operators to Blackpool for the whole area. They had specialized in services to Blackpool since before licensing was introduced and already operated oneand two-day tours and extensive express services to the resort. Mr. Mynett claimed it was those clients who had taken advantage of the two-day tour to Blackpool in the past who were now causing the present demand for the three-day illuminations tour.
For Brown and Sons, Mr. Denis Skelding suggested that Smith's had not sufficient Blackpool traffic to justify them being granted a monopoly of three-day tours to that destination. The two operators drew their tours traffic from two separate areas—Smith's from the Wellington district and his clients from Oakengates.
Mr. Skelding said he did not propose to deal with Smith's express service because they did not operate during the illuminations period and were therefore of no consequence to the applicant. Nor did he propose to deal with Smith's loading figures for 1964 because "they do not make sense ".
In his evidence, Mr. A. R. Brown, a partner in H. Brown and Sons, stated that he was the first to apply for the three-day Blackpool tour and then other Shropshire operators " climbed on the band wagons".