THE TREND OF MUNICIPAL BUS PURCHASES.
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Answers to a Questionnaire Provide Evidence of the Varying Views Held by Principal Authorities on the Relative Merits of Large and Small Buses.
WHEN MUNICIPAL authorities 1111 elect to consider the posaibilities of mechanical road transport for certain classes of work they are in a much mace fortunate position than ordinary trading concerns and individuals, in so far as they are able to secure details of the experiences of other municipalities supported by informative facts and figures from which they can deduce the suitability of motor vehicles for their own particular requirements. In contrast, ordinary traders jealously guard such information and usually take every precaution to prevent details of the working of their fleets from reaching competitors. The merits or demerits of this controversial matter we are not now prepared to discuss, but some idea of the value of informative statistics to those who are more or less inexperienced in the control and operation of motor vehicles can be gauged front the answers yrhioh have recently been received to. a questionnaire set out by the Tramways Department of the Northampton Corporation and addressed tea number of other authorities on the subject of municipal bases.
In all, replies were received from 41 different local a.uthorities, and, as much invaluable information relating to the comparative merits of large and small buses for municipal work is contained in them, we propose giving a digest ,tif the reply received from each authority, the spate at our disposal.being.insufficient to enable us to reproduce the details as given under various headings in the tabular form in which they are published. The information given indicates the types of vehicles favoured by various authorities, and thus serves as an index . to manufacturers of the direction in which potential. p-urchasers may lie.
ABERDEEN authorities express the opinion that the 30-32-seater bus is the most suitable-for general use. They use nine 32-seaters of the ordinary type for bus work and two 20-seater and two 26.
seater motorcoaehes for summer use on regular services. During the rush hours the 32-seaters often carry as many as 40-50 passengers, and it is on account of the heavy-loading periods that the lighter type of bus is not favoured. BIRMINGHAM officials do not consider the small tins of much value from an earning point of view where there is a volume of traffic to be dealt with, and they are withdrawing certain hoses of this type from one of the routes and substituting larger vehicles. Their fleet comprises 53 vehicles, of which 41 are double-deckers, the seating capacities varying from 20 to 54.
The authorities at BIRKENHEAD have only had ex-pexience with 32-seaters during tbe three years in which they have run buses. The fleet comprises 15 vehicles, all of the single-deck type, with the exception of one.
Buses of the 28-32-seater type are favoured in CHESTERFIELD, where the authorities maintain that the large, vehicles are the most useful.
The fleet of the CARDIFF authorities, is equally divided between doubledeckers and single-deckers of 54 and 30-_, seater capacity respectively, Five oneman-type vehicles, each to seat 20 pis. sengers, are to be operated in the more sparsely populated districts and. with lower working costs the authorities hope to make them se.lf-supporting. " In our opinion 20-seater single-deck buses are totally inadequate to deal with rush traffic," is how COVENTRY sums up the question of large and small buses. The authorities use seven 29-seaters and four 36-seaters, all of the single-deck type.
The authorities at COLNE have only had a few months experience, but prefer single-deckers seating 26-28 people, • of which they use three.
Municipal buses have been running in DERBY for six years, where two 26seaters are in use. During three years the authorities of EDINBURGH have built up a fleet of 74 vehicles, of which 72 are singledeckers, each seating 31 . passengers. Large vehicles are preferred to cater for rush traffic, those of a smaller type being suitable for tourist traffic.
Ohl L.G.O.C. buses of the double-deck type are used by the -GREAT YARMOUTH authorities in the summer months only.
The officials of HUDDERSFIELD believe that both small and large vehicles are required, according to the traffic which is offered, and they employ nine single-deckers and two •double-deckers, the former each seating 20-30 passengers and the latter 47 people. Municipal buses have been operated far 10 years in HALIFAX, where oneman-type single-deckers are favoured. The same opinion is expressed by the authorities of HASLINGDEN.
'In HULL large buses are considered the best paying proposition, and accordingly the corporation uses 32 and 46seaters, whilst they are about to use 56seater double-deckers.
• Double-deck buses were originally used in KEIGHLEY, where municipal. buses first operated in 1909. These-have been disposed of, and single-deckers with a seating capacity of 30 are now used. They are considered more suitable for meal-time and week-end traffic, and enable more uniform loads to be
obtained.
Six years operation of buees has lead LANdASTER Corporation-to believe that single-deck, one-man-operated buses are the best to meet local requirements.
The authorities at LEEDS are discarding the heavier-type vehicle in favour of the small bus, which they consider more economicalto run, owing to the fact that it can be operated by one man and gives a high m.p.g. of fuel consumed. They have: operated buses for 18 years, ad consider that the character of local routes
and the low receipts obtained from the buses running on them are against the :use of large vehicles.
barge buses for rush-hour traffic and buses of the smaller type for linking up outlying districts are preferred by the LEIGH Corporation.
The authorities of LIVERPOOL, who have run buses for 11 years, point out that larger buses cost less to operate per passenger carried and meet traffic requirements better than those of the smaller type, although single and doubledeckers are operated.
A neighbouring authority, i.e., MANMESTER, has run buses for nine years, and here the view is held that for light services the smaller vehicles enable a more aconomical service to be maintained, although for heavier services the larger bits is more economical. Most of the vehicles in use are of the double-deck type seating 33 to 54 passengers.
NOTTINGHAM Corporation started with 28-seater vehicles,but it has found it advisable to make use of machines of larger carrying capacity. The latest vehicles to be put in service are six 36.
seater single-deckers. • The question of the small versus the the large-capacity single-decker is at present receiving consideration by the PORTSMOUTH authorities. The authorities now run 34-seaters of the double deck type.
PLYMOUTH Corporation has recently decided that additional buses to be put in use shall be of the smaller type, for it considers that these can be better operated during light-load periods as one-man vehicles; moreover, they occupy less street space and are considered more mobile than larger machines.
Six 14-seaters and seven 26-seaters comprise the fleet. of the ROTHERHAM Corporation, which has had 10 years' experience of bus operation. The larger vehicles are used on heavy traffic routes, and the small vehicles on routes where the traffic is comparatively light.
Those in charge of the SOUTHAMP
TON services originally ran double-deck buses with a seating canacity of 42, but these have been discarded in favour of the 28-seater single-deck saloon type. Four years' operation of buses has shown that heavy wear and tear and excessive maintenance cost result from the running of large buses, which are said to have done mach damage to roads in the rural part of the borough.
STOCKPORT officials, win have used single-deck vehicles of large capacity, state that they hope to be able to double the service maintained by the larger buses at a little more cost when four 20seaters now on order are put into service. A 20-seater is useful on routes that are only sparsely populated is the view of the TODMORDEN authorities, but if there is a possibility of frequent peak leads on either workmen'a or ordinary services, large-seating capacity buses are required. It is not considered possible to run useful services locally with 20 seater vehicles. The authorities have had 16 years' experience of -bus operation, and run double and single-deckers.
Thirty-two-seaters of the single-deck type are considered eminently suitable for the needs of WALLASEY and district.
Both large and small single-cleckers are considered useful for their respective tasks by the WALSALL authorities, but they add that the density and nature of a district most decide the type and size of vehicle which is run.
In special circumstances 20-seater cowman buses are useful, but .generally large-seating capacity vehicles are more satisfactory, say the authorities at WOLVERHAMPTON, who rim two 23-seaters and 17 30-32-seaters, and have had 17 years' operation of motorbuses. Five double-deckers and two singledeckers are in use on municipal service in WARRINGTON, where larger vehicles are preferred, as their running costs are considered very little • higher than those of the smaller type of vehicles. The municipal officials of WEST HARTLEPOOL have not discarded their 32-seater single-deck buses, but they think that it would be advisable to operate smaller otie-man vehicles, which they consider more economical in use.
After eight years' operation of munici. pal services, the authorities of YORK consider that a frequent service maintained agaith a 20-seater type of vehicle is to be_ preferred to an infrequent service, With a larger machine. Their vehicles -are of the 20-24-seater type..
In the preceding epitome we have seen fit not to make reference to the working costs and total costs of operating buses in the various towns and cities given, believing that our readers would prefer to peruse such details in a more compact form. We accordingly giite them below in a form which enables ready comparisons to be made.