NEWS FROM LONDON BRITAIN'S ROAD PROBLEMS

Southland Times, Issue 23782, 1 April 1939, Page 13

NEWS FROM LONDON BRITAIN'S ROAD PROBLEMS

National Effort To Avoid Congestion

Air Mail

By

from TREVOR ROSS

LONDON, March 6. YEARS after other European countries have eliminated road congestion by means of arterial highways, Britain is slowly becoming aware that she herself has a road problem of the first magnitude. Congestion has reached a state demanding a national effort to restore order and make the British roads suitable for fast travel.

Whereas, in Germany, France and other Continental countries, concessions were made to the necessities of motor traffic by the construction of special highways, straight broad and impeccably surfaced, the British roads largely remain as they were before the horse was deposed. Their surfacing is excellent, but they are on the whole nightmare tracks for the modern motorist.

The British road seems to wander where it wills. It seems unable to go straight for long, and in its companionable way it seems to enjoy meeting other roads and making a crossing. To discourage motorists who would speed over these thousands of intersections the authorities have built thousands of “round-abouts” all over the country. These are large islands in the middle of crossings. They force one down to a snail’s pace and each demands a detour of several hundred yards.

By-Pass System THE problem has really become serious in and around the big cities, London’s own difficulties naturally being the worst in the country. Within the metropolitan area the average speed of traffic is slower today than it was 30 years ago. Yet it is beyond the cities where traffic should move at speed that the situation is so quixotic. In desperation the by-pass system was introduced some years ago. Enormous sums were spent in skirting congested areas with first-class roads. But in most instances the authorities forgot to make necessary regulations restricting building along their fringe. The result is that today most of the bypass roads are ribboned with houses and are themselves hopelessly congested. Arterial Roads

AT the moment the Government is being strongly urged to devise a national policy to clear up the muddle on the roads. For one thing, it is pointed out, large-scale and _ swift evacuation of London at the beginning of a war would be impossible. Tortuous roads out of the city would be jammed hopelessly. An effort is being made by the Royal Institute of British Architects to make the public as well as the Government see the danger of delay. This week it is holding an exhibition in its hall in Portland Place with the object of proving that the muddle is now too great for sectional treatment.' After being shown in London this exhibition will go on a twoyears’ tour of the country. It employs every device of design and modelling to show that Britain is years behind the times in dealing effectively with traffic problems. The arterial highway is advanced as the obvious solution. It is a solution with which many visitors from the Dominions who have driven on British and then on Continental roads will heartily agree. Twin Careers

AN extraordinary number of coincidences has marked the private lives and careers of Captain J. W. Burgess and Captain G. C. Butler who will command the flying-boats Aotearoa and

Australia when they inaugurate the trans-Tasman service this year. . The two captains first met when training together at Calshot in 1931. Later they both applied for positions on the navigating staff of Imperial Airways. Without pre-arrangement they actually arrived for the first interviews at the same moment.

When Captain Butler was married in 1935, Captain Burgess was his best man. A month later Captain Burgess married.

Their wives had sons within three months of each other, one being named John Michael, the Other Michael George. Shortly after the wedding Captain Burgess was transferred to the Meditermanean section of the Imperial routes as an acting captain. He was amazed to find that George Butler was to become his first officer.

In July 1936, Captain Burgess was sent to Hythe terminal in England. Within a few weeks he was followed by Captain Butler. They insist that there has never been any design in the curious links that have kept them together for so long. But at Hythe the; close association seemed to be inevitable, so they took flats one above the other. It only remains to say that their wives are very good friends. T elevision

IT seems certain that, New Zealand does not appreciate the enormous strides being made in the development of television. Its growth has been one of the most outstanding advances in Britain in recent years, and within a very short time it will revolutionize the country’s ideas of entertainment. It is almost certain that within a few years wireless sets as we know them will be out of date. This week provided the first really important hint of the shape of things to come. For the first time the paying cinema public was able to see a great sporting event as it happened. The Boon-Danahar fight for the lightweight title, televised by the mobile unit of the 8.8. C., was picked up and projected on to the big screens in three London cinemas. Cinema-television “arrived” overnight and there will now be no delay in withholding it from a public which obviously wants it. The heads of the

cinema industry are convinced at least that the news-reel is a poor thing compared with television. Following the success of the Boon-Danahar fight television Gaumont-British and Baird television officials decided bn the spot to go ahead with the production of apparatus for installation in 350 theatres! The Baird factory at Sydenham will switch over at once to a three-shift working basis. Negotiations have already begun to bring world-famous artists to England, Gaumont mentioning such names as Bing Crosby, Rudy Vallee, /Grace Moore, Eddie Cantor, Deanna Durbin, Benny Goodman and Joe Louis. It would seem that New Zealand will not long be able to neglect the new marvel. Centenarians

SIR Paul Dukes has made the samewhat amazing discovery that there are no fewer than 150 people living in England and Scotland who are more than 100 years old. He has interviewed 110 of them and the results of his inquiries make interesting reading. He found that women centenarians outnumber men by three to one. Poor people, too, are in the majority. Of the 110 interviewed, 80 had passed their lives in poor or very modest circumstances. Very few had never had to work, and many said hard work kept them alive. Two men were still taking an active part in the conduct of their business in their 101st year.

Sixty-six of the 110 were found to be enjoying apparently perfect health although their activities were limited. Sir Paul Dukes says it is important to remember that in the formative years of their lives—in the thirties and forties of last century—their staple diet was coarse wholemeal home-made bread, that sugar and tea were at a prohibitive price and therefore rare luxuries, and that the only beverages most of them knew in their childhood were water and milk. None of the women had ever taken alcohol or smoked, but there was only one life-long teetotaller among the men. The majority were of the stay-at-home domestic type. The oldest of them all, Mrs Emma Coates, aged 108, has spent the whole of her life in a Somerset village except for a brief trip by coach to London 85 years ago. Bible’s Accuracy THE earliest texts of the New Testament known to exist—papyrus manuscripts found in Egypt eight years ago—will be on view in London next week. Experts have been working ceaselessly on these priceless documents ever since their discovery, separating the leaves, mounting them between glass and editing them. They are nearly two centuries older than the ’ Codex Sinaiticus bought for the British Museum from the Russian Government in 1933 for £lOO,OOO. After painstaking researc'n Sir Frederick Kenyon, former director and principal librarian of the British Museum, is convinced that the ordinary reader of the Bible can be assured about the accuracy of the text. Apart from a few unimportant verbal alterations, natural in books transcribed by hand, it has been established that the. New Testament has been handed down the centuries intact. The importance of the discovery of these early writings is that they fill the gap between the earliest vellum manuscripts of the fourth century, and the date at which the gospel was first written down. The papyrus Epistles of St. Paul are dated at 200 A.D., and portions of the Gospels and the Acts are dated from the first half of the third century. The sheets or leaves were found in a block instead of in a roll. They are therefore the earliest manuscript “book” ever discovered. The writing still stands out clearly on the deep golden brown of the papyrus.