FROM FARM TO MARKET BY ROAD!
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The Shortcomings of Railway Transport and the Opportunity Afforded Thereby to Road Transport.
AGOOD DEAL of heartbarning is going on behind the scenes of railway naanagerial offices in agricultural districts.. There are grave and disquieting doubts about the, ability of the railways to retain the transport business of agricultural produce; those commodities which have, since the foundation of the permanent way, proved the companies' beat and most regular source of profit.
And, in all truth, there is grave reason for such uneasiness. had transport has come to stay, and possesses many natural advantages, particularly in dealing with grain, potatoes, turnips? hay, etc., For such commodities are practically unuarnageable, and can be accommodated in any size of vehicle, whilst the extent of the load can be regulated to within a very few pounds. Almost the only way in which agricultural produce can come to harm is by exposure to rain or frost, and this is a hundred times more likely to happen when goods are lying in a fail. way truck for several days, than when being conveyed by road in less than half the time!
Generally speaking, English farmers are absolutely sick of the present mode of transport—by rail. As a rule, they have to cart the stuff several miles to a roadside station, which is expensive, and as the railway rates often do not include a charge for handling,. a sufficient number of men must be sent to unload the drays and to load up the railway wagons.. The railway people neither help nor interfere. They do not check or count the number of bags and bales; they accept the version of the loaders, as expressed on the consignment nate, and their, own invoice is made to agree. The same thing occurs at the destination; unloading and counting are thine entirely by. the employees of the consignee, and there is then the cartage to market: Often there is a difference between the two cheeks, but the railway company does not mind. "Either the sender or the consignee has counted wrongly!" pronounces their high official. "Certainly nothing has been lost by, or stolen from, us, and nothing shall we pay I Settle the squabble between yourselves, please, and for heaven's sake don't worry ME any more!"
This is satisfactory neither for buyer nor seller, and both are very restive. They have done their best to obtain better treatment, but have not sueseeded, and are not likely to succeed until the existing transport monopoly is. really imperilled by a more fully developed rival system. The worst feature of such unbusinesslike dealing is the opportunity it gives to dishonesty. There is absolutely nothing to prevent the farmer's carter from dropping a bag of potatoes at his own back door, or elsewhere, and afterwards assuring his master that the full quantity was duly loaded into a railway truck! Nor is there anything to penalize some railwayman's theft en route, and there is always the possibility of some bag or bale falling from the truck. On arrival at the destination there is a further opportunity gratuitously offered to the dishonest employes, that such opportunities are well known and that they are taken advantage of extensively has been proved up to the hilt, time and time again. Only a few weeks ago, a carter was convicted for such a theft whilst leading trussed hay into the Keadby (Lincolnalaire) station of the Great Central Railway. Four trusses from one particular load did he obtain, and all were sold. He kept the money, and would have escaped all suspicion by blaming the railway people but for the watchfulness of the local police constable. And the railway people, though they would not, of course, have paid, would have been quite unable to rid themselves of suspicion! This kind of thing, coupled with the frequent delay and the ever-increasing rates of carriage, has made rail transport extremely unpopular in agricultural districts, and knowing this, the management sweats profusely. For nothing else that the railway carry is quite so profitable, and gives so little trouble, as agricultural produce!
Only the hesitancy and doubts of road-transport organizers have so long deferred the climax. These people seem unable to forget the return-lead problem. Obsessed by it, they are unwilling to believe that it is quite possible to make agricultural transport profitable without a guaranteed back-lead! Certainly, this particular opportunity for road transport has not been realized as it ought. Consider, for instance, the position in Lincolnshire. Potatoes, carrots, Bwedes, and such like commodities pass almost entirely to one or two Lancashire towns. For Manchester, Bolton Blackburn, and Nelson markets alone hundreds of tons per season pass from half a dozen places compactly situated between Gainsboro' and Brigg. Within this area of fifteen miles the tonnage is so heavy and the railway-wagon loads so many that the railway company actually has truck labels printed by the thousand. " Scawby to
Manchester ' , —" Potatoes for From ," etc.
The position is very similar at all parts of agricultural Britain, for the produce is almost invariably bought from the farmers by middlemen and dealers, who often make a contract before the stuff has even commenced to grow ! Each dealer has his districts and
his markets, so that the flow of traffic is regular and sustained in its direction, subject t-e very few variations.
It is true, of course, that the railway rates for agricultural produce are not so high, comparatively, ,as with other commodities of a mote bulky or more damageable nature, but -the consequent guarantee of good loads and the reduced risks are surely as potent a factor in determinieg a road transport rate2 Moreover, a road transport rate would be for carriage from farm to market, not for conveyance between two points that are each miles, perhaps, from either farm or market, thus involving a more or less serious cartage. So that a road transport quotation might be considerably higher than the railway charge, and yet prove cheaper to the farmer and the dealer! When there is, as an additional argument, the suggestion of immunity from the present unsatisfactory discrepancies between the quantity sent from the farm and the, quantity reaching the market, there seems little or no doubt that we have before us a most promising field for the activities of the road transport organizer.
It should even prove possible to obtain a return load in a great many cases. There is always a large quantity of merchandise to be conveyed from industrial centres and market towns, and the transport contractor should be able readily to find it.