A COSTLY WAITING GAME.
Page 20
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group of photograph* repro duced on this page deal with the transport delays in the ferry areas of Birkenhead and Liverpool, which are costing vehicle owners in the aggregate many thousands of pounds per annum. Not only is there congestion, but, obviously, the speed of the vehicles is controlled by -the speed of the slowest of those in the queue. Our first illustration depicts the head of a queue (which, at the moment of taking the photograph, numbered 40 vehicles) waiting at Birkenhead for the Liverpool luggage boat. The second photograph shows the line formed up at the same time on the Birkenhead floating bridge. From our third photograph, it will be menthat the traffic in the streets of Liverpool near the ferry approaches must suffer from the congestion caused by the • vehicles waiting for the ferry. This is a view taken at the bottom of Chapel Street by the overhead railway, underneath which is another set of rails used for dock railway haulage. Our fourth photograph shows the type of luggage boat used for the work of transporting the vehicular traffic across the Mersey. The boat is seen alongside the landing-stage, and it can be understood that the work of loading and unloading must, because of the small size of the boats, be delayed, that delay being aggravated when the motor vehicle is hauling a trailer. It is then that manceuvring in a confined.space is sown to be so difficult. The last photograph of the group is the scene on Liverpool landing-stage. Vehicles are •compelled to wait at. the pier-head to get to the stage, and again at the stage for the ferry-boat.
The need for the solution of the trouble of the cross-ferry traffic has been urgent for many years, but it seems very difficult to find, and in the meantime, with a regular increase in the traffic, matters are getting very much worse. •