SMALL TRAMWAY PROFITS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19, 24 January 1911, Page 6

SMALL TRAMWAY PROFITS.

The statistics relating to the working of the city tramways for the first nine months of the current financial year, which we published yesterday, are of a kind to give the municipal reformerpause. On some previous occasions during the last two years the economy induced by the financial stringency was mentioned as a cause which tended to check the increase of the tramway revenue, and it was doubtless a true cause. 3ut this cause has fortunately ceased to operate, and the returns show a gratifying increase in the number of passengers carried. In the period < extending from Ist April to Bth December, 1909, the number was 14,514,621; in the corresponding period of 1910 it had increased to 15,107,693. The effect of this increase of about 4 per cent, in the number of passengers was, of course, felt by the revenue. The revenue for the •period mentioned was £85,928 last year, and has increased during the present year to £88,902. The increase of £2974 in the revenue from this source is in itself satisfactory, but it is unfortunately j more than counter-balanced by increaseof the^ working expenses, which amounts to £4734. The net result-of these figures is that the financial returns of the tramways are £1760 worse for the first nine months -of the present financial year than they were for the corresponding period of last year. If the Power Supply Account is included, the position is slightly improved, the revenue from this source having increased by £502 against an increase of £310 in the expenditure ; but capital charges and other items more than neutralise this improvement. Grouping the two acoqunts-' together, the balance for 1909 shows- a credit of £421, while for 1910 there is- a debit balance of £1300. This result- is decidedly disappointing, and though it gives no cause for alarm; it certainly justifies some concern for the-futnre of 'our tramway ad•ministration. Together with the -official figures wepublished yesterday a statement from the Mayor which puts a better complexion on them. His Worship suggests that items have been charged to working expenses which might, have been omitted. The largest of these ie street-widening, which amounts to £1170. It has been the practice of the City Council when the enlargement of a street has been, re quired to reduce the dangers arising from the congestion of traffic caused by the tramway to apportion the cost between the District Fund and tho Tramway Account. What would be. an equitable apportionment is rarely, if ever, ascertaini able with precision. Experts can be of little assistance in a matter which admits of no exactor measure than the "rule of thumb." Tho Mayor's sugges1 tion, however, ia apparently not that the present method of apportionment is wrong, but that tho portion debited to. the tramways mighit legitimately be made a charge upon, capital instead of j working expenses, and here the experts I would probably say that he is right. I The charge of £337 for track duplication Lfieema ta. «t.as4 in the earns category.

The Mayor compiles from theeo and other items a total of £2267, the mnova! of whjjch firom working expenses would cliacge a loss of £1300 into a profit of £957. Wliether there are other items to which a converse process should not be applied, we are not in a position to say ; but the inferenco which Mr. Wilford says might be drawn, viz., that the tramways 6howed a better profit last, year than in 1909 by £536, seenus fallacious, since there must have been some items in that year from which it might be similarly claimed the working expenses account should be relieved. Though the Mayor has given some good reasons for holding the position to b© not quite so bad as it looks, it is nevertheless far from satisfactory. The City Council is -at the best sailing far too close to the wind, and not allowing -a sufficient margin for emergencies. It might well, staa't the New Year with a review of the lefi'ect of all the concessions which it has made during 1910, and .a. determination not to carry the process any further or even to reverse some of the concessions already made until the Tramways Account shows a wider margin, and this great and crucial experiment can. be regarded ac an assured success.