FARES GO UP

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 115, 11 November 1929, Page 10

FARES GO UP

FOR AUCKLAND TRAMS

WELLINGTON PEOPLE LUCKY

MAHGIN SHRINKING

I Nowhere where trams are run ia everyone altogether satisfied, and here in Wellington passengers register their grouches as the occasion seems to demand, but at any rate there is here not much ground at present for the complaint as to long-distance fares. ' A few ■weeks ago a proposal was made to the recently-constituted Auckland Transport Board 'that a universal threepenny fare system should be instituted—a true universal fare over all distances, whether one section or five— but was turned down by majority vote. The board has now adopted a new scale of fares in an effort to retrieve the loss of H 22,000 which it is estimated will ne suffered by the end of the present working year. In all cases the increases in soncession card rates there are fairly substantial. The new rates (twelve-trip tickets) are: One section, Is 9d; two sections, 2s Sd; three sections, 3s 6d; four sections, 4s 3d; five sections,ss 3d; six sections, 5s 6d. The cards will be available on Suudays, the board deciding that although there will be extra working costs and that cards may not be used in Wellington, Christchurch, or Dune"din on Sundays, it could recover its revenue without banning their Sunday use. This, by cho way, is rather a sore point with many Wellington travellers, who protest that fivepence from town to the seaside on Sundays is too high, and argue that the Tramway Department would more than make up the difference as a result of many more people using Sunday cars. The department is, so far, not to be moved. It is also interesting in this connection to note that one of the recommendations made by the Wellington Tramways manager, Mr. M. Cable, regarding the- operation of the Wanganui trams, was that a special return fare should be instituted on the Castlecliff run on Sundays in order to induce people to use the Sunday cars. - Circumstances and places apparently alter general rules. The special fare in Wellington is the cash fare, considerably higher than the week-day concession fare of threepence. BUSES, TAXIS, AND CARS BLAMED The difficult position .in which the Auckland transport system is to-day was made clear by a statement attached to the fares increase report and the remarks of-the chairman of the board. The new rates are expected to bring in additional revenue of £34,271 per year, but as only five months of the present year remain, and as cash fares for the first five months or so of the year brought in revenue £24,000 lower than for the corresponding period last year, though revenue from concession cards was £1200 better, there1 will reniain this year a net shortage of between £22,000 and £23,000. The increase in the number of private ears carrying both -owners and •friends, the low fares charged by taxi-ear proprietors, the development of suburban shopping nreas, and the prevailing unemployment difficulty combined to bring about tho difficult position, said tho chairman of the board in introducing the proposals for increased fares, and the service was further hampered by losses sustained by the taking over and running of unprofitable buij services. Tho new rates did not go through without strong opposition, for several speakers maintained that tho result would simply be that more people would bo induced to get along without the tramß and that the new ratei were simply playing into the hands-of the owners of taxis, already "as thick as bees," with the result that instead of gathering in £34,000 more revenue the board would be £10,000 per year worse off than before. CAN THE WELLINGTON CONCESSION LAST? A comparison of Wellington's cheap long-distance fares with those of other centres makes fairly cheerful reading, but, on the other hand, moves one to consider whether the threepenny fare from one end of the city to. tho other can last for any great length of time, for though the Wellington system is operating upon a sound basis, probably as sound a basis as any transport svstem. in New Zealand or Australia, the, margin, after loss on bus services has bitten heavily into tramway system profits, leaves very little to come and go on. There arc several needed tramway extensions—for instance, a new line running more directly to Miramar, via Seatoun road, at the head of Evans Bay, and the Miramax- cutting —but the yearly margin appears to prohibit the undertaking of such works. The council has, ever since bus com- \ petition forced the introduction of the threepenny fare, upheld the concession as a Wellington advantage to be maintained to the last ditch, but if'the margin between operating expenses and revenue, after provision has been made for reserves, sinking fund and special appropriations, contributions to tunnel driving, and the like, shrinks to nothing, the last ditch will appear to have arrived.