PUBLIC CONVENIENCE

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19236, 25 November 1930, Page 6

PUBLIC CONVENIENCE

' I 'IIE IDEA of permitting the overloading of buses on wet nights is too dangerous to be entertained for a moment, because wet weather with reduced visibility and the dangerous reflection of lights increases the liability of street accidents a hundred per cent or more. Yet the demand for increased accommodation on wet nights draws attention to the fact that the tramway authorities do not rise to the occasion during wet weather, and frequently shut out women passengers—it happened on Fridaynight in Cathedral Square—when the solitary bus is filled up to the legal maximum. Moreover, the pay-as-you-enter system, which keeps long queues of people standing in the rain, is not suitable to rush hours, and a casual conductor or inspector might very w-ell collect fares inside the bus for the sake of more rapid loading and public convenience.

IS LONDON CHANGING?

OIR HUBERT SMITH’S new survey of London social life does not indicate that there are any special changes affecting Londoners more than the inhabitants of any other city. The lessened consumption of alcohol can be attributed directly to the effect of the restriction of the hours during which alcohol can be sold, and the increased consumption of tobacco is mainly attributable to the systematic advertising of the tobacco companies. It is true that England has gradually become more sober, but then alcoholic liquors are appreciably weaker than they used to be, and the motor-car, whatever else it has done, has induced a widespread abstinence among the “ upper classes.” It is not recorded whether Londoners eat less than they used to eat. They have alway-s been hearty feeders, and London literature teems with stories of great banquets as well as with indications that private" as well as public eating has always been excessive. But one has only- to read Eighteenth Century literature to realise that the heart of London has not actually- changed, although mechanical and scientific progress and bureaucratic government, general and local, have compelled many changes of habit.