TRANSPORT INQUIRY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19947, 16 May 1928, Page 13

TRANSPORT INQUIRY.

SITTING OF COMMISSION. CASE FOR LOCAL BODIES. CITY COUNCIL ASSAILED. A WHOLESALE CONDEMNATION.

The suburban local bodies opened their attack upon the Auckland City Council as a transportation authority before the Auckland Transport Commission yesterday. The City Council had closed its case after occupying nearly a fortnight in presenting it and answering criticism.

Mr. J. S. Barton, S.M., presided, with Messrs. W. G. T. Goodman and A. Edward. Messrs. J. Stanton and A. H. Johnstone appeared for the City Council, and Messrs. E. H. Northcroft, H. M. llogerson and J. M. Melville for the suburban bodies, Mr. V. R. Meredith being temporarily absent. Mr. Northcroft, beginning a speech o! nearly four hoars' duration, said the controversy really dated from the City Council's purchase of the tramway system. At that time, according to Mr. Allum, the undertaking was "in great difficulties, tending to an intolerable position." Yet the proposal had been submitted to the ratepayers as if the tramways were in an excellent position, entirely desirable, and a profitable purchase. If the latter was the truth, then Mr. Ford's expenditure of nearly £500,000 on permanent way could not be justified. Counsel went on to describe the state of affairs which, in the opinion of the suburban bodies, existed immediately before the advent of bus competition. Tramway passengers, he said, were disgracefully treated, and were compelled to travel in the greatest possible discomfort. Numbers of people had to walk as far as the Victoria Street intersection in order to get seats, and lower down the street the cars were besieged by crowds, whose annoyance was not lessened by the action of the conductors in putting up the chains, often before the cars were loaded to capacity. A Sudden Repentance. Bus competition brought immediate relief at peak-hours, and caused ' the tramway authorities promptly to repent. However, they were too late in trying to appease an angry public by running buses themselves, increasing the tramcar mileage, and generally improving the tramway administration. The p (blic supported those who had come to their relief—the bus operators. The City Council was driven to the unworthy expedient of getting special legislation. Needless to say, this did not improve its popularity with the travelling public of the metropolitan area, who regarded it as indecent and unjust. Still the legislation served . its purpose, which was to suppress competition. Later, to the dismay of the community, notwithstanding this special legislation, the City Council proved unable to carry on its transport system without loss. In this situation, the City Council had applied, not for more or altered legislation, but for a Royal commission to find | out why it, as a transportation authority, was "off-side" with the people of Auckland. "The council is in the position of a plaintiff seeking a certificate of character," Mr. Northcroft said. "It offers a defence—" Mr. Johnstone: I thought we were plaintiff. Mr. Northcroft: A defence to the attacks upon it, and a justification for its claim. Proceeding, he said the local bodies held it to be no concern of theirs. However, the Government had asked them to give what assistance thf.y could, and they Had agreed The System of Control. Referring tp the clause in the order of reference instructing the commission to inquire into the best means of providing for the present and future transport requirements of the district, as regards mechanical improvements and systems of control, Mr. Northcroft said that with all respect he would submit the subject was not one to be approached in that way or by such a tribunal as the present commission. The transport of passengers in congested areas was entirely in the meltingpot. The contest was between the independent automotive vehicle and the tram running on rails. It would be a bold man who would say what the next 10 or 15 years would see. Both systems were developing, but the development of the motor-bus was much the more rapid." There remained the political question, how best the transportation system of Auckland could be governed in the period of experiment so as to give the best possible service to the public and allow elasticity for the development of either trams j or buses.

In the period 1905-1913 the tramway company put on 83 new cars. There were no additions between 1913 and 1920, when the council took over. The council might be excused for making none in 1920, but in the next four years it added only 19 cars, an average of just under four a year, against more than 10 in the company's 1905-13 period. This was in spite of the fact, that the arrears of the 1913-20 period had to be made up, and the population had increased by at least 50 per rent, between 1911 and 1924. How could the council have expected to move the people at anything like th 9 rate of earlier The council showed at this stage a complete, almost wanton, disregard of the duty which it had accepted when it took over the tramway system. Later it did a very grave injustice to the bus operators who had stepped in and given urg-ently-needed supplementary services. Responsibility for Legislation.

The injustice lay in this, that only after the operators had put capital into their ventures did the City Council seek legislation to put them out of business. It was only fair to say that Mr. Ford was not to blame. Before bus competition began he had recommended t-hafc it be made illegal. Had the Tramways Committee taken his advice there might have been legislation in 1922, instead of; 1926. The Chairman: Are you crediting the City Council with putting the legislation through ? Havo you read the statement of Mr. E. P. Lee in the House of Representatives, summing up the evidence taken by the Parliamentary committee? Mr, Northcroft: .No, 1 havo not. The Chairman: I would recommend you to. The evidence was from all the centres of New Zealand. There were also schedules showing what had been done iri English cities, and even cables from their Mayors. Mr. Northcroft said the evidence had been instigated by the Auckland City Council, which had really initiated the legislation. This was a matter of history, and he would challenge anyone to disprove it. Mr. Stanton remarked that°Mr. Ford s report of 1922 had been made to the Mayor; there was no evidence that it had been put before the council. Continuing, Mr. Northcroft said the penal fare might or might not be justified as broad policy, but it was obviously intended gradually to strangle the private bus services. Two courses were open to the Government, either to declare bus competition legifTmate, or prohibi i after a certain date. The Chairman: 'lhat is one matters on which the Government applied for and obtained information about what municipalities in England did. Mr. Northcroft: I understand that one city, Leeds, adopted the penal fare.

.Mr. Stanton: Leeds pioneered it. is now almost universal.

Air. JSioithcroft said another was that the City Council had not taken legislative authority to create a transport monopoly within its own boundaries cuf those of its transport system. Without* such authority it had obtained monopolistic control over a wide area. 'i'here> would be less room for criticism if a. pioperiy representative and ir dependent, licensing authority had been up. Council as Licensing Authority. " A more gross violation of the element* ary rules ot justice could hardly have been perpetrated," declared counsel,* in referring to the present status of the City Council as a licensing authority. It was not enough to say there was a transport appeal board. Whatever the commission's finding, he anticipated that this grave blemish would be removed. Although the bus proprietors had a real and legitimate grievance against the council's policy, the districts which had developed during the period of private bus transport had one also. The council should show by satisfactory figures that buses in the abandoned districts could not be made to pay under sympathetic administration. Some districts had notbeen deprived of transport, but had been compelled to accept feeder services, which were costly, unsatisfactory, and inconvenient to fiie passenger. Moreover, these people had been harassed by being constantly threatened with the removal of the services. The City Council had also perpetrated an injustice upon its own ratepayers. It admitted that not one of its bus services was paying. The figures put in by the tramways department had not been compiled as one might expect of a responsible public body. The running cost to the bus-mile had been calculated for the whole bus system. No attempt whatever had been made to find out the runnirig costs of individual makes or even types of vehicle. Bias Against Buses. Three routes, Point Chevalier, Dominion Road and Mount Eden Road, ran through densely-populated districts, which Mr. Ford and Mr. Allum declared to be ripe for tramway extensions, but did not show on the council's books a profit on their bus services. This must be regarded as most unsatisfactory. Other routes, since earlier days when more detailed accounts were kept, had shown a strange falling off in revenue. None of the council's officers had been able to explain it, but each had referred counsel to the others. The trouble appeared to be that the officers had been brought up in the tramway tradition and had little knowledge of or sympathy with bus transport. Every piece of evidence showed the trams had been fostered and bus traffic neglected and discouraged. The department seemed anxious only to prove its contention, which was that buses were uneconomic and should be put off the road. There was ample ground for saying that tramway profits had been much overstated. Evidence would be led to show the sinking funds on the loans raised in 1922 and 1924 would give a deficiency of £87.638 when the loans reached maturity. Unless and until the council made adequate provision for the redemption of its loans, it was not entitled to claim the profits were what they were stated to be.

The Central Depot. Of the £IOO.OOO unemployment relief loan, £40,000 had been spent on capital work, and £60,000 on renewals properly chargeable to revenue. Of the latter sum, £30,000 had been spent in 1927 in carrying out an accumulation of renewal work which should have been done either out of a special renewal fund or out of the 1927 revenue. The council had in fact spread the expenditure over the whole loan period of some 50 years. In any event, an adjustment should have been made for the expenditure in calculating the profits for that year. Counsel criticised what he alleged to be the looseness of the computation carried out in arriving at the proportions of track renewal expenditure charged to capital and revenue respectively. The council had spent, on Mr. Clark's estimate, a quarter of a million, and on the computation of the outside bodies nearly half a million, on permanent way reconstruction, without consulting the ratepayers. Another matter about which the city ratepayers had not been consulted was the Gaunt' Street depot. It would be submitted that a central tramway depot was unjustified and uneconomical. Depots should bt> in residential, not industrial areas. It. was true that limited car accommodation at a central point was desirable to deal with special traffic,' but this was relatively a small matter.! If, it was suggested, the Ponsonby depot could not be enlarged, it should have been recoqditione.d and a third depot should have been built in another suburb, preferably in the south-western area, say, near Mount Albert. A Threatened Punishment. Referring to the diversion of loan moneys, Mr. Northcroft declared that nothing could be more disgraceful than the shameless manner in which tho City Council had spent money on works entirely different from those for which thai ratepayers had given it. Referring to the rejection of tba £500,000 lean, Mr. Northcroft said that Mr. Allum now declared himself in favour of legislation to give the council power to raise loans without consulting; the ratepayers. ' He could say without hesitation that no council which seriously advocated it would remain long in office.What tho council had told to the local bodies was, in effect: "We could hava given you extensions in 1924, bnt yon encouraged these dreadful bus people, and to punish you we will not give you tha extensions you ask for." Then it had suddenly declared tho extensions wera urgently needed and had tried to get tha money for them, but because of soma quarrel between the council and its ratepayers it had been unable to do so, and the outside residents were deprived of! the extensions. Counsel went on to complain of inaccuracy in the City Council's returns. Every figure that had been challenged, had proved to bo in some particular unreliable, and the inaccuracy had always been in favour of the council's contentions. If this were so in tha present proceedings, how could the local bodies hope to get proper information at other times t On matte policy, Mr. Ford had been studiedly non-committal. Mr. Allara had no such hesitation* He said, io effect, "Everything is satisfactory. Leave it to me." In other words, he held that things should go on in the present quarrelsome, muddlesome way and # the losses made by the council at its * ratepayers' expense should continue. The Transport Board. The outside bodies had not come forward merely with destructive criticism* They stood as advocates of a metropolitan transport board, to which reference was made in the order of reference. The reasons why sucfi a board might be expected to solve the difficulties now experienced were:—(l) The whole area served would be represented and would have a voice in the control of transport; ! (2) the present lack of co-operation and harmony would be eliminated; (3) oil extensions would be within the board s own area; (4) questions of fares, sections and time-tables would be settled without reference to other bodies; (5) financial responsibilities would be spread over the whole area and it should be possible to run some services which otherwise woul not be justified at the outset; (6) the Residents of the district would receive their services at cost. No conference of local bodies had been held to draft a constitution, but it was suggested the board should be elective, «n a population basis, with a comparatively small membership, 12 at the most* It should be elected on the ward system, in order that the members might have an intimate knowledge of thpir respective districts The term of office might be two vears and tha franchise should be on a "popular basis, using the Parliamentary or municipal electoral rolls. The transport area should extend from Henderson in the north to Papskura in the south, since this was the real metropolitan area. There should be_ power to vary the boundaries by Crder-in-Cooncfl. on tho board's initiative; Mr, Northcroft will continue , address to-dajy .4 -- ,