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Motors Aid Decentralization Economy

2nd December 1939
Page 24
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Page 24, 2nd December 1939 — Motors Aid Decentralization Economy
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

EVENTEVENTS of the past two months or so'have served refocus attention upon the ethics and economics of decentralization. They have, in addition, emphasized the part already played, and indicated those parts still to be played, by the commercial motor in the final solution of this much-debated problem.

Even prior to September, a cursory examination revealed that the motion for a more uniform distribution of industry was commanding rapidly increasing favour. The reasons for this are not far to seek. Available space in industrial nuclei had long been, virtually, fully occupied. On the basis, therefore, of the law of supply and demand, such space was commanding prices which, themselves, were incentives for prospective settlers to migrate elsewhere.

Initially, it was natural that such movements should be limited to the immediate environments of the nucleus itself. Communications of every type, from the centre to the periphery of developed areas, were, in most cases, already well established and quite competent to deal with the new growth.

Such movements as these, however, were obviously palliatives, rather than preventives, of an issue which, sooner or later, was bound to arise. That is to say, the peripheral areas tended in a short while to become so popular that the arguments which had originally led to their inception could be returned with equal: AM force on themselves. Lines of communication became congested, and much of the advantage which might have been achieved by increased rapidity of transport was lost in traffic jams, hold-ups, and the thousand and one difficulties which tend to beset the commercial-vehicle operator in a densely populated environment.

The coming of the war accelerated an inevitable move. Decentralization, instead of being confined merely to a process of expansion from already existent nuclei, was constrained, for a variety of reasons too well known to need repeating here, to establish new nuclei. It may transpire, therefore, that industrial evacuation, however hurriedly carried out, and, in many cases, ill-conceived, may ultimately prove to be the progenitor of a new order of industrial geographical-economy.

In support of this argument one specific industry will be cited, and it will be briefly demonstrated how the facilities made available by the modem commercial vehicle constitute links which complete a chain already half forged by other organizations.

The case in point is the aluminium industry, hi which, paradoxically enough, a co-ordinated scheme of rigidity in standardization of products has done so much to impart the maximum flexibility in functioning of the system. The consumer has no need to wait • on the producer's doorstep to get what he wants. Matters have been so arranged that virtually everything he requires has already been produced, A trunk, call, materials ordered on the basis of an established code, and, no matter where his works may be, motor vehicles, in some cases specially designed for the purpose, bring the materials to him.

In the industry itself, production centres for the raw metal must be located near cheap sources of electrical energy. Some degree of centralization is obviously necegsary here. Initially, the working up of the raw metal into " semis " was carried out in industrial centres already established and provided with equipment capable of dealing with the work in hand. With the expansion of the industry, however, fresh centreiis were created, new plant was erected and, between all three points, that of production, the earlier-established fabricating centres and the new,

commercial vehicles could be relied upon to maintain a flexibl3 line of communication.

So true, indeed, is this, that where, in one case, such a works was established in an otherwise ideal centre, which, however, lacked a water supply suitable for carrying out a certain process, special vehicles were actually built to bring water to the desired point.

Nor can limitations which might be imposed by difficulties in catering for the transport from distant points of a large personnel, now be advanced as arguments in favour of centralization. Passengervehicle services adequately provide for any contingen-cies which may arise in this direction. Decentralization, the logical sequence to our industrial growth, must no longer be regarded as anything but an ideal within our grasp.

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