The Wanganui Chronicle WEDNESDAY, MARCH 28, 1928. THE WORLD-WIDE TRANSPORT WAR

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20107, 28 March 1928, Page 6

The Wanganui Chronicle WEDNESDAY, MARCH 28, 1928. THE WORLD-WIDE TRANSPORT WAR

pi AT the problems of modern transport are world-wide lias been shown nonvineingly in recent months. In New Zealand, the United States and Britain the railways have been robbed of much business through road competition, and the serious extent of this opposition in New South Wales is indicated by a message published this morning.

In a few days the present financial year in New Zealand will have ended, and it will be interesting to see how the State’s service has fared with the increased motor transport operating of recent months. In a speech in Wellington a few days ago the Rt. Hon. J. G. Coales, in his capacity as Minister for Railways, issued a sort of call to arms to members of his Department. The next two or three years, he warned them, would see a transport war in which the railways would be put to a very severe test, and though a heavy expenditure might be necessary he felt confident of an ultimate victory.

It is always pleasing to find a Government Department keyed up to a high pitch of efficiency—and it must be admitted that the Railway Department has worked hard in the last two years—but Mr Coates’ fighting speech will cause much apprehension. As the country learnt from the contest between trams and buses, public enterprise, in a fight with private enterprise, may succeed by methods which, besides being unfair, may in the long run cost the country dear. If the railways, by economy and efficiency, can hold their own against road competition, no one will complain, but if they do so with the aid of protective legislation and unprofitable concessions the taxpayer will have been badly served. There can be no virtue in bolstering up an uneconomic system of transport, and if, for instance, buses prove their superiority for passenger traffic over short distances, railway services must be reorganised accordingly.

It is perhaps too early to say that the buses have ousted the railways in any particular sphere, but it has to be realised that in both the United States and Britain, despite the advantages of private ownership, the railways are faced with a very serious falling off in revenue through road competition. The latest issue of the American Mercury gives an interesting review of the present position in the United States. In 1920, it is pointed out, the Inter-State Commerce Commission set 5J per cent, as a fair return on railroad investments, but in six years since that time the railroads of the country have failed to earn this sum by over a billion dollars. Their average profit in the years 1920-1926 was only a little over 3 per cent., and according to the writer, there is little likelihood that it will be much more for many years to come. This is attributed almost entirely to the use of motor vehicles for passenger traffic over short distances, and as a consequence the railroads are relying largely on the stimulation of long-distance travel to win back their losses.

This does not mean that they have given up the fight over short distances, for they are still fighting hard in this sphere, but the mere fact that they themselves are going in for fleets of buses shows that they have not much confidence in the possibility of making rail transport more attractive in this direction. It is too' early to predict the result of the struggle, but it has to be realised that here, as well as in America, the railways have not only lost the dominant position they occupied twenty-five years ago, but are being called on to show that they have not been definitely superseded in certain departments of

transport. In their own interests the taxpayers of New Zealand must watch the struggle dispassionately and take care that they % are not deluded into paying too much for a service merely because it is a public service.