Hopes for a Rail Resurgence Expressed • F HE user of transport
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should have the freedom to choose which form he 'anted to use, because only he knew the idividual requirements of his particular istribution problem; if he wanted to use
n expensive form of transport because stilted him, he should be allowed to o so. Transport was and always must
e a service. It was not an end in itself id therefore regulation or direction of affic by Government was inappropriate id would not result in the country aving the benefit of the most economical ansport. service overall. So said Mr. A. McMullen, head of the central ansport department of I.C.I., in a paper, The User's Choice ", given to the istitute of Transport's Metropolitan :ction in London on Monday.
But Mr. McMullen added the qualifiition that, given freedom of choice, ere must be education of the user to ;ercise that choice wisely and he must ipreciate the consequences of his choice.• There must also be efficiency in each irm of transport, he went on. Far too -ten an inefficient performance by one cans of transport was compared with efficient one by another. This did not can that the efficient performer was .tcessarily the right one to choose in the !neral community interest. "Here overnment can play its part by influenng investment policy, particularly in hat we now call infrastructure ", he marked.
'ail The Cheapest
Basically the cheapest form of wheeled land transport, given proper equipment, ganization and suitable traffic, was that rail; but it was unlikely the user's oice would influence traffic to rail iless there was definite practical idence of this, combined with improved iciency.
A modern railway using modern tthods, and with its back turned on the st, still had great potential for serving e country. Not only this but, if our ilways could so improve what they 'ered the user, this country would be ved the kind of development that has ppened in the United States. Even in nerica—a large country—enormous iounts of space had been used up by road artery developments. "Here we have not the space so readily available and, anyway, do we want our rural and suburban scene scarred with weals of concrete and macadam? ", he asked.
One found too, he said, that with all this new road construction, two distinct road infrastructures were coming into being; the 'special" roads and the " ordinary " roads. The country therefore finally had three transport infrastructures—railways, special roads and ordinary roads, the ordinary roads being in part complementary. to the special roads and railways and in part a trunk communication system of their own. Looked at this way, one saw that so far as future potential was concerned it was the economics of freight movement by rail, fed by ordinary road where necessary, and the special road fed by the ordinary road which must be compared. Recently there had been a swing of interest in America to rehabilitating and improving public transport.
The Lesson The lesson for this country was a proper realization of the importance of our public services. It must be in the interest of everyone that what the public services offered was self-selling, attractive and of a higher standard than ever before. If present trends continued, there would only be more and more pressure for, additional road capacity, and the general movement of passengers* and goods would cost the community more than it otherwise would.
The matter went deeper than making comparative cost studies before decisions could be taken on the form of transport to be used. Modern thought on the railways was alive to this, but the new ideas and economic possibilities arising therefrom must be put over to the user now if his future choice of transport was to be exercised in his own and the national interest.
The message he was trying to convey, said Mr. McMullen, was quite a simple one. First, we must know whether the railways could achieve their potential as a low-cost and efficient means of transport. Secondly, if this were possible (through Government %support), the users should be given this alternative transport. Thirdly, it must be supported by adequate salesmanship. Fourthly, the user's freedom of choice must be maintained " but we may expect a trend towards using the cheaper, better services to be offered by rail".
Railways, Mr. McMullen was sure, had a large part to play in solving this country's transport problems. But the user's choice had got to be wooed, and wooed in a different way than it has been in the past.
In his paper, Mr. McMullen reviewed the reasons for industry's use of its own road transport. Much that had gone to influence the user's choice were the surface reasons such as: control of deliveries; saving on packaging; control of staff; advertising and prestige; and reduction in stocks held. There was also the ease with which a trader could start doing his own haulage.
However, one had to go a little deeper into the question. Before choosing, insufficient thought was given to what in the aggregate the effect of the choice might be. The surface reasons naturally carried the day and the end result might well be that the community as a whole paid more for transport than it should.
National Aim
The national aim should be to reduce to a minimum the sum of costs relating to: amount paid by users for railway system; rail deficit; cost of road transport, less taxation; and "cost of providing, maintaining, policing and signalling roads plus cost of the licensing system, Ministry of Transport, etc.".
There were, he said, four basic criteria for a transport system. These called for economy in: capital cost; manpower to operate and maintain the system; power to move the vehicles; and ground space on which to lay the track, terminals and other ancillary services.
It did not follow that road capacity was what, or where, the commercial vehicle operator would like. Looking far enough ahead, one could visualize a time when it would not always be possible to operate road transport with the degree of precision and reliability currently possible.