TRACKLESS TRAMS WILL COME SOON.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18940, 10 December 1929, Page 8

TRACKLESS TRAMS WILL COME SOON.

SHOULD BE A SUCCESS IN CHRISTCHURCH CITY.

“The great advantages of the trackless tram are its mobility and the great saving in the capital cost of installation compared with the trail system,” said Mr W. Hayward, chairman of the Christchurch Tramways Board, to-day, when questioned concerning the trackless tram motion picture viewed by the board last evening.

After expressing appreciation of the picture, Mr Hayward said that the board’s interest in the matter was shown by the fact that tenders had been called for the supply of trackless trams for use on certain routes. “We have received information about the use of these vehicles from all over the world,” he said, “and in every case the reports have been very favourable. In on . e . or two the tramway authorities are taking up their rails and substituting trolley buses or trackless trams. It is confidently expected that they will be equally successful in Christchurch provided good roads can be found on which to operate them. “The present state of the tramway finances here is due largely to two injustices that the tramways have suffered. The first was the abolition, through some legal technicality, of the special rating areas, which has meant that some districts receive tram services and are relieved from a rate they had originally agreed to pay. The second injustice lies in the fact that the area of streets and roadways maintained by the Tramways Board has had to carry a large proportion of the city’s traffic without the board receiving in return one penny from the petrol tax or the Main Highways Board. We don’t use the space between the lines and yet we have to maintain that as well as a strip on either side. That area carries probably 75 per cent of the traffic of Christchurch.”

Asked if there was any likelihood of the tramway services being extended provided the trackless trams proved a success, Mr Hayward said that the institution of any new services would have to be very carefully considered. “Christchurch made the original blunder of extending her tramway service much too far,” he said. “This city has fifty-three miles of line, compared with Dunedin’s seventeen miles. Even Melbourne has only eighty miles.”