OUR LONDON LETTER

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7865, 29 July 1911, Page 1

OUR LONDON LETTER

TOPICS OF THE DAY LONDON’S “WOODEN WALLS.” FROM OCR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT. LONDON, June 16. For the Coronation Loudon is onco again to bo a walled city. For the first time since Lu<i Gate and Bishops Gate crumbled into mins with tlio walls of London, a largo part of Central London is being circled about with barriers of wood, brick, and stone. 'Wooden romxiarts with heavy gates are being erected to ensure the safety of the crowds at almost every street leading to the: routes of tho two processions, and when the work is complete there will bo a chain, of wooden walls and bouses enclosing the entire district through which tho royal procession will pass. Seventy barriers in all are being erected, and they will be closed by the police at any point whenever ft may bo necessary to prevent overcrowding or any sudden rush. • . ~ Carpenters are busy day and mgnt completing these barricades, the gates of which are 12 feet high, the whole being made of stout new timber, the posts—sunk feet into the roadway being of 8 to 10 inch pine, the cross bars ot 3x9 andr the boarding an inch and a half to two inch stuffy .. t . . These preventive • barriers, which are strong enough to withstand any assault from a crowd unprovided with artillery of battering rams, have been built up regardless of cost. If they had keen designed - for permanent structures - they could- scarcely have been, more solidly and soundly constructed. And so it is with ■ all the temporary Coronation, erection. The . stands erected. along the lines of route are built up in a manner that - precludes any dear of accident save by fire. It is said that not one of the 1-100 stands already licensed by the various municipal, authorities "is capable of bearing less than threeror four times the weight’ of humanity, trad will bo placed upon . them. / Many ox them have been subjected to the severest possible tests' in the shape of scores, ol policemen and soldiers jumping from tier to 'tier in unison, or trotting up and down each row. of seats. .. .. , It is estimated that .£150,000 nas already been expended in wood and labour on these temporary structures, land the demand for timber has sent up , the price of wood fully. £2 per standard of 165 cubic feet. . . Statistics : supplied of these wooden stands show tho provision heme made for the expected legions of spectators . Number of stands —— 1.800 ’ Cubic feet of timber used 1,650,000. Number of scats provided ... .900,000. It is ' estimated!, that: there, twillbe room in the streets, apart from seatholders on stands, for 1,000,000 .persons to view ,-tho. procession on Coronation Day,, whilst on. the morrow many times that number will be able to view the royal progress through London in comparative comfort from the pavements. That there will bo big crushes at certain points along the lino of route may be taken, for granted, but as a general rule the street viewers-will suffer no discomfort ’beyond having" to get, up with the ' lark, stand for several hours, and find their way home by unaccustomed routes. The very precautions the police are talcing against the anticipated crowds have determined thousands ot Londoners to spend Coronation Day. and its’successor out of town.. It . was the same at’ the Diamond J übileo time, and on the occasion ’of King Edward’s .Coronation. a ■ , ■ ... i The high prices demanded for seats to view" and the fear of tho street crowds drove thousands upon thousands of Londoners out of town, and prevented the incursion of legions of provincials. The same, tale wiU-bo told agaan. Every other man. you meet is going away for Coronation Day and ; the ensuing week-end, and speculators, in “seats to view" are 1 biting their nails. 1 At first there: was: quite: a rush for them and fancy prices were readily paid for anything like a decent position, .but to-day there are signs in plenty to snow that the early birds paid dearly for their -worms, and tho cry on ; the day itself will be “Seats are cheap to-day." ihis, of course, applies, to the progress through Loudon, 1 not* to Coronation Day itself. The restricted . area over which the actual Coronation procession passes naturally greatly enhances .the value ot seats therein, and no doubt the muster of -pavement spectators will be unpleasantly thick everywhere along the line of route where the public is permitted to congregate. ; ~ ■ ■ ■ , LONDON’S JUGGERNAUTS. The man from overseas who described his first week in London as “a_ period of miraculous escapes" was really not drawing the long bow very much. io Londoners inured to tho rush of vehicular traffic, crossing the main streets, ot the City and,the West End is rapidly becoming something to be .accomplished with great caution;, to strangers - unfamiliar with the street turmoil of large towns it is already a proceeding fraught with dangers. -The chief source of these are the motor driven vehicles and the greatest of all the motor-omnibus. These huge contraptions are the Juggernauts of our streets. Hardly a. day passes on which they do not claim a human sacrifice, and during the past few weeks the daily toll has risen- to an alarming extent. ■ This week has boon, particularly prolifle in motor omnibus accidents. Nine persons were . injured in Lambeth through a collision between two motor omnibuses; a boy was run over, and it is feared fatally injured in Fleet street; one of Liberty’s shop windows: was shattered by a motor bns which ran amok in Regent street, owing to defective steering gear, and another bus collided with a cart in Fleet -street, killed a horse, demolished a jeweller’s shop-front and sent tho contents flying all over the P *Wh<3ro does the fault lie? The motor bus - is little ■by little getting within measurable distance of perfection as regards reliability and control,, and the latest pattern vehicles are a vast improvement on the older types as regards noise, smell, and smoothness of f unning. And it is just this approach to perfection. that seems to cause the accidents. The drivers are too sure of their-power over their vehicles. They take risk* confident in tho belief that they can pull it up in its own length, even when going at fifteen miles an hour. And ae. a rule they can. But if anything goes wrong with the brakes, or steering gear: or i' the wheels strike a greasy patch of roadway, “ the" driver has no more control over the bns than he would over tho charge of a mad elephant. 33ie chief pauses of .disaster ero stoer-

inK-eear troubles and skidding, and abso* lutelv reckless driving. , The safety of life and limbs is sacrificed'to speed and there is a tendency on the part of motordrivers to disregard those cardinal .rules , : of ‘ the, road which hitherto made London ; traffic, in proportion to .its volume, the safest and most orderly in the world- . There wore dangers in. tne_ days or the did horse omnibuses, arming chiefly . from racing between the vehicles of rijal companies along crowded*, routes, but those dangers were as nothing compared' with those caused by the racing among motor ■'buses going on to-day. It is no uncommon sight to see half, a dozen fire or sir ton motors tearing down Fleet street at twelve miles an, h°ur or more with only a foot or’eo befcweon tho ‘T>onnet ,i of one and the 'tail of its leader, and each driver snatching at any opening to get the load. The result is that if there is anything in front the ’buses have to be brought up with a . jerk that . sends the . passengers flying ■ from their seats, and subjects the wholo fabric of the 'bus to a tremendous strain which must inevitably produce weaknesses in the vital parts of the machinery, which will ultimately result in * serious accidents. , ! . ■■ The menace of . the motor 'bus. in London is very real r and Londoners are beginning to realise the fact , that they ore paying too big prices for the one great advantage of those vehicles, which is speed, vigorous protests are now being made against the unchecked rush of these heavy cars through _the streets, and if the ’bus companies, fail to heed them they will, for a certainty, find themselves faced by a degree; of public resentment :■ which they -vHII : b© unable •to withstand.■; ■ Vi■ SAILORS ON STRIKE. The long-threatened strike of : seamen* : was commenced last Wednesday, but it is, : at. present impossible to say what‘ _ its ©fleets will be on the trad© and com- ‘ mere© of the Old Country. Much depends on what proportion, of; the mercantile marine of this country the Seamen's , Union can influence, and. whether;; that body possesses funds sufficients to support the men during a strike. The shipowners’ view appears to. be tliat .the union, cannot cause any great and senoua inconvenience because it represents only a minute percentage of sailors; that its funds' are at a very low ebb, and that the vast majority of the sailors are fairly well satisfied with the working conditions at the present , time, and emphatically do not wish to strike. That is the owners’ view as put forward by the secretary of, the Shipping-Federa-tion, a corporation which includes .thirteen millions out of the United Kingdom’s total tonnage of fifteen, millions,/ and is responsible for the employment of about 100,000 hands,: On* the other hand, the officials of the Seamen’s Union are confident that xmles* . the owners give way they are in a posi-. tioa to paralyse the shipping .trade of the United Kingdom and. bring about, if necessary, an international strike. Those demands include the creation, of a conciliation board and a general rise in wages. Neither of these things are the. members of the federation prepared to even discuss with the union, which they have consistently refused to recognise on the ground, that it is net in any way representative of the . teamen, of this country. The federation,' whilst refusing to - admit that the Seamen's Union can make really serious .trouble,, is, however, preparing for emergencies. They are .©©tab- •* li&hing depots. all round the "coast so that any strike-breakers whose services - may be required will not be interfered wifca by strikers or their sympathisers. News from the vanir ns ports show that the,.attitude of the, men towards a strike : is very varied. At. Bristol and Newcastle and Sunderland :th©-- strike Ims fallen very fin t, whilst at Hull, out of some 4000 , seamen . present at a : mass meeting, only, a, couple; bf hundred accepted- 1 , the mvitati on.! tn h and *in their discharge cards and accept strike pay At Southampton and Liverpool anion’s invitation .to strike met with a better response, and a f Glasgow it was received with some enthusiasm. On the whole, however, the strike does not appear to b© finding favour • with,V the general body of seamen. : Possibly. the statement ?•! persistently made . that . the ; union Ims very little money available for strike pay has a good,deal to do with the lukewarmness: with which its call to armahas becm.receiv©d in.many qnartecau.