MUNICIPAL MOTOR TOURS IN LEEDS.
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• The Enterprise of the Local Authorities Meets with Success During Civic Week.
TITTRING the recent Civic Week at
Leeds an important part was played by commercial motors in achieving the object of the promoters of this futiction, namely, the development of an interest in the city by residents and by potential supporters of its trade and industry. To give the public an opportunity for noting the growth of the new local housing and road schemes and for observing public works in progress, or completed, a series of motor coach, tours was arranged. These tours were an undoubted success and, in addition to the corporation's vehicles being used for the purpose, the coaches of private owners had to be requisitioned to accommodate the heavy traffic.
Two tours were arranged, the first
comprising a run through Temple Newsam -Park, the public works to the south-east of the city, Middleton, the new roads and housing schemes to the south-west, past Kirkstall Abbey and via the •Hawksworth Wood Estate, West Park and Headingley Lane back to the starting point The second tour included Headingley and the Ring ,Road to Weetwood, Moortown and Meanwood, through the Meanwood Housing Estate and along the new and picturesque • Gledhow Valley Road, to Shadwell and Cross Gates Housing Estate. The distance covered in each case was about 28 miles and is. per passenger was charged.
The buses left the Town ,Hall each day at 2 p.m., 4 p.m. and 5.30 p.m., but tickets had to be booked a day in advance at the tramway offices or at the city building superintendent's depart ment. On the first day, 700 people took tickets and 25 vehicles were used, but subsequently the fleet had to be conside.libly augmented and •between :)00 and 1,000 passengers were carried on the following day. .
The official handbook in describing the municipal activities of Leeds states that the motorbus plays an important part in the transport of passengers to and from towns and villages surrounding the city. The view of the corporation that there is no immediate probability of the present local system of electric traction being superseded has been supported by its recent purchase of 200 tramcars of a new type, but it is pointed out that the latest development of the transport undertaking lies in the more extensive adoption of motorbuses, which, being used at first, so far as Leeds as concerned, for the linking up of suburbs by means of routes proceeding across country, were found to be a great convenience, inasmuch as they enabled transit to be made from one suburb to another without the inhabitants being under the necessity of travelling into the city before they could journey to their outer destinations.
Recently, express bus services have been arranged, and these give quicker transit with fewer stops from the extreme reaches of the Leeds boundary to the centre of the city, whilst services have also been introduced on routes nearer to the heart of the city, on whi:th tramway services, with the necessary heavier capital expenditure, could not be econonlically justified.