PROBLEMS OF TRAFFIC.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20420, 23 November 1929, Page 17

PROBLEMS OF TRAFFIC.

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE ROAD.

NEED FOR MORE COURTESY

PRINCE OF WALES' APPEAL. [FROM OUR. OWN COnRESI'ONDENT. 1 LONDON, Oct. 18. A striking appeal to motorists to exercise more courtesy on the roads was made by the Prince of Wales at tho Commercial Motor Users' Association banquet this week. "This problem of the roads is a very serious one," tho Prince said, "and it may bo a very much moro serious one if all tho commercial motor users and tlio private motor users do not get together and co-operate to prevent this becoming a very great battle of the roads." He referred to his own experience as a motorist and an airman, and made his appeal, "looking down from my new 'vantage point.' " "One of tho most important things commercial and private automobile users

have in common," said tho Prince, "is that we share tho same roads. Let me talk for one minute of what I may call the psychology of tho road. That is a thing that we motorists must have studied at many times. Tako the private motor user who is at times extremely inconsiderate. He never thinks of tho unfortunate man who is driving a lorry, say, from Bristol or Birmingham, or very much further afiold, and is arriving in London, and he is always inclined to put liiin over the rails. (Laughter.) Tho next time that lorry-driver inects a motor ho tries to get a bit back and does not draw into tho side of the road and got out of tho way." Commercial users of motors, the'Princo added, could impress on their employees to give room to these vehicles built for another purpose, and enable pcoplo to keep their appointments by not blocking the road. He referred to a book which had been sent to him concerning trials for heavy motor vehicles held in Liverpool in 1898. "Even in those early days," the Prince went ou to say, "special attention was paid to noise, smell, visible vapour and other nuisances when driving. Although some of us may wonder if there has been very much improvement in that direction we have to admit a very substantia] advance in the average speed of commercial motor vehicles, which were then required to reach a speed of only six miles per hour in class one, and four miles per hour in class two." (Loud laughter.) Mr. Herbert Morrison, Minister of Transport, said that the Government had carefully considered tho first report of the Royal Commission on Transport, which dealt with tho control of traffic on roads, and would shortly have the second report dealing with the licensing and regulation of public service vehicles. It was impossible any longer to defend the present system of licensing, based as it was on Acts which wero passed long before motor vehicles wero known. The urgency of traffic control and licensing was fully recognised by the Government and would be dealt with at tho earliest practical moment.