THE CO ACH AS A PRIVATE-HIRE VEHICLE.
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An Extensive Private-hire Business, in which 50 Coaches are Employed, Operated by the London General Omnibus Co., Ltd. Private Hire Displaces the Book-seat Business.
MEE success of the motorbus in London, of course, has helped to develop its use by the public as a means for pleasure, and by reason of this fact the London General Omnibus Co., Ltd., was induced, some years ago, to cater for the public's love of road travel by conducting a series of coach services, the trips extending over periods of a whole day or half-day and, at the same time, the company established a privatehire service for the transport of private parties on journeys both short and long.
This private-hire branch of the business has grown to such an extent that it has entirely displaced the chance trade—if such an expression can be applied to the day trips, which actually very rarely lacked sufficient custom entirely to fill the coaches.
A Big Mileage Score.
The company, therefore, has during the past year concentrated on this private-hire work and, during the summer period, which commenced in June and ended in September, the total distance run by the General coaches on private-hire work was 337,840 miles, and, as would be expected from the very fine organization laid down for the conduct and maintenance of its coaches, the company has experienced scarcely a single delay arising from mechanical failure.
During the three months or. more covered by the period of operation, 2,100 orders were executed, involving the employment of a daily average of 40 vehicles. The total available fleet is 50 motor coaches, and each coach has approximated 80 miles per day.
Skilful Driving a Feature.
To deal further with the question of the absence of failures, the result is certainly a testimony to the skill and efficiency of the men and their machines, as the coaches were frequently called upon to negotiate roads that were almost impassable, and with the weather a very uncertain factor a strict running-time schedule would seem to involve a severe task. Skilled and efficient driving, however, have been at the bottom of the success. The L.G.O.C. coach drivers are fully qualified mechanics, capable of executing their own repairs ; they are, therefore, not to be ranked with the bus drivers, who are not encouraged to make anything but the most minor adjustments to the mechanism under their charge. The coaches, again, have been frequently docked for overhaul, the result of which has been that the fleet has been kept upon the road almost continuously throughout the summer. Yet another factor which contributes towards successful running and reliability is the policy of allocating one vehicle to each man and, wherever possible, each driver has taken charge of a particular vehicle throughout the whole of the season. In this way the men are able to get to know the little peculiarities of their machines and to obtain the best results from the vehicles. There is also to be considered the factor of personal pride of 'the driver in his machine. .
Some Lengthy Tours.'
The long-distance tour has not been ignored by the . company, for although the London General Omnibus Co. does not participate in the seat-booking business, vehicles and staff provided by it were let for 13 separate tours of six days and over; generally for American parties. On one tour as many as six coaches were employed. The 13 tours averaged 1,000 miles in length. One to which particular reference may be made started from London on June 28th, a 28-seater semi-saloon coach having been booked for a 20-day tour in which the route covered embraced the following places :—Liverpool, Ambleside, Cockermouth, Keswick, Grasmere (Lake District), Ayr, Edinburgh, Durham, York, Bradford, Lincoln, Exeter, Lynton end Lynmouth, Glastonbury, and Hereford. The total mileage covered on this tour was 2,763, and every inch of the prearranged route was followed and no time was lust.
In the autumn another 28-seater semisaloon coach was used by the Doily Mirror for touring seaside and provincial towns with its 32 page-boys, each boy representing a page of the paper. In all, 2,200 miles were operated over a period of seven weeks, without any mechanical or other trouble, a_ fact which speaks highly for the maintenance system and the mechanical efficiency of the driver.