The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1910. THE TRAFFIC OF LONDONE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2751, 4 March 1910, Page 4

The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1910. THE TRAFFIC OF LONDONE.

A London writer has been considering the fascinating subject of the traffic of the greatest metropolis of the world, and he has succeeded in. collecting many very interesting facts. Time was, and not so long ago, when the rate of traffic, however congested, was always slow, and tlie timid pedestrians had ample time to look ahead and cross th-- street. To-day all this is changed. Till; pact- of a “taxi” with a clear field before the cabman lias not yet been ro_ ducod to any known formula. The abolition of the rule which compelled a driver wishing to get in front of another to pass on a prescribed side, nece.vsary as it no doubt- was from the point of view of lessening blocks, has greatly multiplied the risks of crossing the street. You are never secure against the sudden emergence of some faster vehicle from behind the slow one you are carefully avoiding. These are but the everyday risks, —those which accompany the traveller in London from the moment ho leaves his house to tho moment when he returns to it. But at certain crossings the risks are immeasurably greater. There the passenger is assailed from all quarters of the compass at once. He is the helpless object of converging streams of traffic, each and all seemingly bent Tipon finding a meeting-place in liis prostrate body. Here and there, indeed, a rare refuge raises its head above the crowd, or tlie form of a benevolent policeman is seen standing firm where everything else is shifting. But how is either to be reached? Safety—momentary safety, at all events—is within sight, hut the problem how to get to it seems as hopeless as ever. Somehow or other it is reached in the vast majority of instances, but who shall say at what expenditure. of nerve-power or wihat risk of heart-failure?' It must be admitted that this sad picture applies in all its terrors only to the visitor, or to the resident who is but occasionally called upon to go into really crowded streets. The ordinary Londonor, the man whose daily business makes him familiar ■"••+V these terrors, soon comes to forget, and for the most part to escape, them. It is well that he should, for all the signs are that as the years pass on tho motors xvi 11 more and more monopolise the streets. As regards the amount of traffic Londoners are, it appears, at the beginning of a far greater development than anything that has yet boon witnessed. They seem to bo ' entirely giving up their own legs as instruments for getting from place to place. Tn part this is the result of increasing pressure- of business. The time spent in walking to a shop or an office is now spent with more profit*—more financial profit, at all events —in getting there half-nn-hoitr earlier. Besides this, there is another cause of the increase of traffic in the fact that London is every day getting to cover a larger area. More and more its inhabitants tend to go further afield when

their day’s work is done. It is liard indeed to say what they get by the change, because the immediate neighborhood of 'London is seldom either one tiling or the other. The appearance of a town is exchanged for that of a debatable land where bricks and mortar struggle for the mastery with broken hedges, fields from which the grass has been removed, and trees which the storms of next winter will in .\ll likelihood strip of their last branches. Statistics give evidence of the gradual supercession of horsccabs by motors. There is still a lingering feeling in reference to hansoms which has prevented their absolute disappearance, and four-wheeled cabs hold their own to a surprising extent. It is not likely, however, that this will long be the case. At first starting suspicion of the accuracy of the measuring machine kept some people from using “taxis,” and a doubt as to the amount that would be demanded by the driver at the journey’s end was even more effectual as a dissuasive. But these objections have disappeared. “Taxis’-' are not appreciably dearer than horse-cabs for the longer journeys, and for short journeys they are often cheaper. The immense difference in point of speed makes them infinitely more useful. The change is a real advantage to London traffic, because each cab takes so much less time to finish its journey, and the motor-cab wants less room when it is standing in a rank. It is satisfactory to learn that more than half the drivers were formerly drivers of horse-cabs, and that “'the younger men are said to accommodate themselves to the change with remarkable quickness.”

Still, the great mass of London traffic will always be carried on by omnibuses, tramways, and railways. Of omnibuses the supply has in recent years more than once been in excess of the demand. In the busiest time of the day the average occupation of seats on omnibuses passing the British Museum Central London Station was 60.0 (per cent.), and on those passing, Lancaster Gate 46. It seems to have been found better to keep the horseomnibuses for the more crowded parts, and the motor-omnibuses for the suburbs. When there are constant'stoppages the motor lias no real advantage in point of speed. Another point ol interest is the comparative prospects of motor-omnibuses and tramways. Sir Herbert Jekyil, of the British Board of Trade, who has investigated this question most thoroughly, is of opinion that tlie future lies with ihe motor-’bus, and that it would do so to a still greater extent were it not that the municipalities, with whom working at a profit is not the first consideration, are so deeply committed to the tramways. His reasons are that tramways are no longer capable of improvement. They are as good and as cheap as they are 'kei.. to be. whereas the motor-omnibus is still in its infancy, and is likely to grow with great rapidity. It is a fact, we learn, that already some municipal authorities “have been reduced to a]>peal to the ratepayers to patronise their own tramways.” The advantages of the motor-omnibus over the tramway are obvious. It can travel in streets which arc too narrow for tramcars; it does not obstruct other traffic to the same extent ; it dees not cause the inconvenience involved in -he construction and repair of the tramway,—an inconvenience specially felt where a tramway is owned by a municipality. which is under no obligation to hasten the completion of the work.