Abstract
AT the present time the industry of transport seems to be far from flourishing. In the aggregate, statistics show that road, rail, air and water transport are losing money. We welcome therefore the paper by W. Rees Jeffreys, chairman of the Roads Improvement Association, on transport problems of the Empire, which was read to the Royal Society of Arts on November 29. He takes a world-wide view of the whole problem, pointing out some of the causes of the depression and making many helpful suggestions. All forms of transport are the servants of the community. They serve trade and industry, and so long as they are serviceable they are entitled to a fair remuneration. They are not entitled to place a burden upon trade or industry by excessive charges or by dictating to the producer and the manufacturer what kind of transport he shall employ. Anti-road transport legislation within the Empire for the purpose of protecting State investments in railways has failed to bring prosperity to the railways concerned. Railway finance has often failed because it proceeded on the assumption that railways are permanent and can always be made profit-earning by regulating rates. In Great Britain, road finance has proceeded on sounder lines, as highway expenditure has been met largely out of current expenditure. The ill-conceived legislation which has introduced rigidity into railway rates, wages, hours and conditions of labour has hindered progress to recovery. Co-operation between all kinds of transport is necessary, and rigidity is fatal to it. The closing down of non-paying railways and their conversion into roads should be encouraged. In the discussion, Mr. C. Erlund stated that an enormous saving could be effected so far as goods are concerned, by electrifying several of the main-line railways. This makes electrification a far more attractive proposition than it appears in the Weir Report.
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Restoration of Prosperity to Transport. Nature 131, 126–127 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/131126c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/131126c0