WIN FOR MOTOR

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 635, 11 April 1929, Page 7

WIN FOR MOTOR

TRAMWAY LINES SCRAPPED DECISION IN ENGLISH TOWNS A new and important stage in the conflict between the electric tramcar and the petrol vehicle has been reached in Kngland by the decision of two provincial tramway companies to scrap their lines aud replace them by railless methods of traction, states the “Observer.” These are the Chatham and District Light Railways and the Mansfield District Tramways, which between them operate nearly 30 miles of route in busy and populous centres. The Chatham Company seeks to operate omnibuses, while the Mansfield undertaking proposes to adopt the so-called “trackless trolley,” and electrically - driven omnibus which derives its power from overhead wires, but is not confined to a railed track.

Both these schemes are of special significance, inasmuch as they represent the first occasion on which -c has been proposed to abandon the whole of a tramway system in tavour of more modern methods of traction. Various municipal tramway owners have already adopted the trackless trolley on individual sections of route, while others have preferred to employ motoromnibuses rather than extend their tramway mileage. But action of the kind has hitherto been piecemeal, and no municipality has so far proposed to scrap an entire system. The policy of the Chatham and Mansfield companies is, therefore, of unusual interest, and it is not without its bearing on the London traffic problem. While no impartial expert would suggest the abolition of tramways in the London area, the greater mobility of the railless vehicle suggests that there is much in favour of the argument that no fresh lines should be laid i down, at least in the more central or most congested districts, and that any extensions to existing tramway services should be provided by means of the motor-omnibuses.