AIRSHIPS UP-TO-DATE

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 94, 25 August 1913, Page 4

AIRSHIPS UP-TO-DATE

The Manchester Guardian, discussing the scheme for an aerial passenger service between Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, London, Brighton, and Paris, says if it should ever get beyond the prospectus stage it will help to bridge the rather wide gap that now exists between the desire to explore the sensations of travelling up aloft and the rare and (for most o; us) rather daunting opportunities of Hying in an aeroplane. In Germany the idea of "running" dirigible balloons in this way for profit is no novelty, but we doubt whether commercial success has yet been attained. The promoters of the new English venture speak of beginning "modestly" with a couple of semi-rigid MO-horse-power airships carrying a dozen passengers each and "fitted with restaurant cars and the most up-to-date accommodation" : gigantic revolving sheds for the accommodation of the ships would be built at each terminus, and the fares are already fixed—€ 6, from Manchester to London. So far no estimate of the capital cost of this modest beginning, nor any calculation of the probable revenue and expenditure has been given, and the Guardian hopes that the capitalists who may be invited to seek fortune in this way will not. be too much interested in such sordid aspects of the matter. If they are. it fears that they may have to wait some time vet for their first voyage.