OVERHEAD SPEED ROADS FOR CARS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18014, 26 November 1926, Page 4

OVERHEAD SPEED ROADS FOR CARS.

ELEVATED WAYS FOR FAST TRAFFIC MOOTED BY LONDON EXPERT. (Special to the “ Star.”) I LONDON. September 29. Elevated high-speed roads for motor traffic, with footways for pedestrians, were sugested at the Royal Commission on Cross River Traffic in London yesterday by C aptain G. S. C. Swinton, a former chairman of the L.C.C., as a means to solve London's traffic problem. Captain Swinton said the roads should be independent of cross-river traffic, bridging not only the Thames, but also the Thames Valley in places, and running North and South. He did not think a bridge crossing the Strand, as he suggested. would seriously affect trade in the Strand or the amenities of the district. Congestion blocks, he said, were rarely foreseen. For serious congestion there was only one cure—by-passing above, below, or round. Our tube system was the most successsful method of by-passing. It should be extended. Perhaps the making and linking up of tubes could be subsidised as an alternative to spending money on street widenings. He had always wondered why the Kingsway Tube was not extended to cross the river. The problem of the bridges, said Captain Swinton, would best be solved by double-decker bridges, he suggested, at Blackfriars and Charing Cross. He was informed that the Chafing Cross scheme was the one proposal

which could induce co-operation with the railway company. • Though there was no double-storeved bridges of importance in this country, on the Continent and in America there were many. We had architects fully competent to do justice to so great an opportunity. Mr Humphreys, the chief engineer of the L.C.C., said he would prefer not to say at once whether or not Captain Swinton's scheme could be carried through without interference with railway traffic. The Commission adjourned until today. ___