TEAMS AND BUSES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18862, 10 November 1924, Page 9

TEAMS AND BUSES.

CONCERN IN WELLINGTON.

COMPARISON WITH AUCKLAND

CITY COUNCILLORS' VIEWS.

A long discussion on the questions of providing feeder;; to the Wellington tramway services, of "getting in first." with motor-bus or other services, arid «>i" overcrowding of tramcars on city lines generally took place at the meeting of the Wellington City Council last Thursday.

Mr. A. L. Monteith said that if .the council did not consider the question of feeders for the trams, there was a very great dauger of a motor-bus competition coming into being. It had been stated that a big American motor-bus company was starting in Wellington, and tho council should take notice of this. The time had arrived when the council itself should do something in the matter. If not, small buses would gradually come in, and would ply for hire. When tho

council did make a commencement, it would then find • that it was up against

competition. He referred to what was happening in Auckland.

Mr. W. H. Bennett mentioned the j large number of buses which were plying for hire in Auckland. The council there had built one motor-vehicle to compete with the buses, and to try to drive them out. In that vehicle, the speaker felt, the Auckland council had made a very great mistake. It was a very heavy vehicle, and was not very easy to manage. The buses were working in other districts beside the scattered ones, and in Queen Street and Symonds Street they were becoming quite a problem. The Wellington Tramway Committee might look into the matter with a view to having some kind of a feeder service to the outlying districts. Ho had learnt that a bus, formerly on the road between Wellington and Day's Bay, had been taken off this service and was now running in< Auckland. "The Best Tramway Service." Mr. Chapman maintained that for many years the tramways had not truly served the needs of tho city. There was much overcrowding, and several of the suburbs were not. properly catered for at all.

Mr. Forsyth: "We have the best tramway service in New Zealand." Mr. Monteith: "Yes, and the most overcrowded."

Mr. Chapman: "It is not nearly so bad in Auckland."

Mr. there."

Forsyth: "It is not allowed

Mr. Chapman said that tho onl\' thing that had saved Wellington's tramway system from bus competition was the narrow streets in the centre of the city, but competition was beginning to come in the suburbs.

The Mayor, Mr. 8.. A. Wright, said that he could not see any great likelihood of buses being run in districts not served by the trams. What had happened in Auckland was that the buses followed tram routes, and picked out the eyes of the tram traffic. The council only had to remember the experiments made in Wellington—from Kelburn to Karori for instance —which lasted only a few weeks. "What is wrong in Auckland," continued Mr. Wright, "is that they have put down magnificent roads." The laying down of such roads opened up the whole question of transport. The question was whether the present system was not becoming obsolete. Trackless cars were taking the place of rail cars in certain English towns. Wellington's Trackless' Car. The tramway department, added the Mayor, was now exploring possible routes for either trackless cars or buses, so that the question was not being overlooked. So far the council had been very well satisfied with the trackless car to Kaiwarra, but it wa<, the first vehicle of its kind in Australia or New Zealand, and naturallv the wise policy Avas to proceed cautiouslyMr. Aston said that perhaps the council had been too hasty in reducing tramway fares. Passengers were apparently not so extremely dissatisfied with the fares holding prior to the reductions, and the £1000 involved in those reductions might perhaps have been more wisely employed in extending services to parts of the city not at present catered for.