THE MOTOR OMNIBUS
Prior to the emancipation of the road automobile in 1896, permission had been granted to corporations to run trams driven by mechanical power through towns. The steam tram, its engine protected by a case which hid the machinery from the view of restive horses, panted up and down our streets, drawing one or more vehicles behind it. The electric tram presently came over from America and soon established its superiority to the steamer with respect to speed, freedom from smell and smoke, and noiselessness: the system generally adopted was that invented in 1887 by Frank J. Sprague, in which an overhead cable supported on posts or slung from wires spanning the track carries current to a trolley arm projecting from the vehicle. The return current passes through the rails, which are made electrically continuous by having their individual lengths either welded together or joined by metal strips.
In America, where wide streets and rapidly growing cities are the rule, the electric tramway serves very useful ends; the best proof of its utility being the total mileage of the tracks. Statistics for 1902 show that since 1890 the mileage had increased from 1,261 to 21,920 miles; and the number of passengers carried from 2,023,010,202 to 4,813,466,001, or an increase of 137·94 per cent. It is interesting to note that electricity has in the United States almost completely ousted steam and animal traction so far as street cars are concerned; since the 5,661 miles once served by animal power have dwindled to 259, and steam can claim only 169 miles of track.
Next to the United States comes Germany as a user of electricity for tractive purposes; though she is a very bad second with only about 6,000 miles of track; and England takes third place with about 3,000 miles. That the British Isles, so well provided with railways, should be so poorly equipped with tramways is comprehensible when we consider the narrowness of the streets of her largest towns, where a good service of public vehicles is most needed. The installation of a tram-line necessitates the tearing up of a street, and in many cases the closing of that street to traffic. We can hardly imagine the dislocation of business that would result from such a blockage of, say, the Strand and High Holborn; but since it has been calculated that no less than five millions of pounds sterling are lost to our great metropolis yearly by the obstructions of gas, water, telegraph, and telephone operations, which only partially close a thoroughfare, or by the relaying of the road surface, which is not a very lengthy matter if properly conducted, we might reckon the financial loss resulting from the laying of tram-rails at many millions.
Even were they laid, the trouble would not cease, for a tram is confined to its track, and cannot make way for other traffic. This inadaptability has been the cause of the great outcry lately raised against the way in which tram-line companies have monopolised the main streets and approaches to many of our largest towns. While the electric tram is beneficial to a large class of people, as a cheap method of locomotion between home and business, it sadly handicaps all owners of vehicles vexatiously delayed by the tram. At Brentford, to take a notorious example, the double tram-line so completely fills the High Street that it is at places impossible for a cart or carriage to remain at the kerbstone.
Another charge levelled with justice at the tram-line is that the rails and their setting are dangerous to cyclists, motorists, and even heavy vehicles, especially in wet weather, when the "side-slip" demon becomes a real terror.
English municipalities are therefore faced by a serious problem. Improved locomotion is necessary; how can it best be provided? By smooth-running, luxurious, well-lighted electric trams, travelling over a track laid at great expense, and a continual nuisance to a large section of the community; or by vehicles independent of a central source of power, and free to move in any direction according to the needs of the traffic? Where tramways exist, those responsible for laying them at the rate of several thousand pounds per mile are naturally reluctant to abandon them. But where the fixed track has not yet arrived an alternative method of transport is open, viz. the automobile omnibus. Quite recently we have seen in London and other towns a great increase in the number of motor buses, which often ply far out into the country. From the point of speed they are very superior to the horsed vehicle, and statistics show that they are also less costly to run in proportion to the fares carried, while passengers will unanimously acknowledge their greater comfort. To change from the ancient, rattling two-horse conveyance, which jolts us on rough roads, and occasionally sends a thrill up the spine when the brakes are applied, to the roomy steam- or petrol-driven bus, which overtakes and threads its way through the slower traffic, is a pleasant experience. So the motor buses are crowded, while the horsed rivals on the same route trundle along half empty. Since the one class of vehicles can travel at an average pace of ten miles an hour, as against the four miles an hour of the other, no wonder that this should be so. Even if the running costs of a motor bus for a given distance exceed that of an electric tram, we must remember that, whereas a bus runs on already existing roads, an immense amount of capital must be sunk in laying the track for the tram, and the interest on this sum has to be added to the total running costs.
The next decade will probably decide whether automobiles or trams are to serve the needs of the community in districts where at present no efficient service of any kind exists. In London motor buses are being placed on the roads by scores, and the day cannot be far distant when the horse will disappear from the bus as it is already fast vanishing from the front of the tram.
Both petrol and steam, and in some cases a combination of petrol and electricity, are used to propel the motor bus. It has not yet been decided which form of power yields the best results. Petrol is probably the cheaper fuel, but steam gives the quieter running; and could electric storage batteries be made sufficiently light and durable they would have a strong claim to precedence. There has lately appeared a new form of accumulator—the von Rothmund—which promises well, since weight for weight it far exceeds in capacity any other type, and is so constructed that it will stand a lot of rough usage. A car fitted with a von Rothmund battery scaling about 1,500 lbs. has run 200 miles on one charge, and it is anticipated that with improvements in motors a 1,100-lb. battery will readily be run 150 miles as against the 50 miles in the case of a lead battery of equal weight.
There is a large sphere open to the motor bus outside districts where the electric tram would enter into serious competition with it. We have before us a sketch-map of the Great Western Railway, one of the most enterprising systems with regard to its use of motors to feed its rails. No less than thirty road services are in operation, and their number is being steadily augmented. In fact, it looks as if in the near future the motor service will largely supplant the branch railway, blessed with very few trains a day. A motor bus service plying every half-hour between a town and the nearest important main-line station would be more valuable to the inhabitants than half a dozen trains a day, especially if the passenger vehicles were supplemented by lorries for the carriage of luggage and heavy goods.
In this connection we may notice an invention of M. Renard—a motor train of several vehicles towed by a single engine. We have all seen the traction-engine puffing along with its tail of trucks, and been impressed by the weight of the locomotive, and also by the manner in which the train occupies a road when passing a corner. The weight is necessary to give sufficient grip to move the whole train, while the spreading of the vehicles across the thoroughfare on a curve arises from the fact that each vehicle does not follow the path of that preceding it, but describes part of a smaller circle.
M. Renard has, in his motor train, evaded the need for a heavy tractor by providing every vehicle with a pair of driving wheels, and transmitting the power to those wheels by a special flexible propeller shaft which passes from the powerful motor on the leading vehicle under all the other vehicles, engaging in succession with mechanism attached to all the driving axles. In this manner each car yields its quotum of adhesion for its own propulsion, and the necessity for great weight is obviated. Special couplings ensure that the path taken by the tractor shall be faithfully followed by all its followers. A motor train of this description has travelled from Paris to Berlin and drawn to itself a great deal of attention.
"Will it," asks a writer in The World's Work, "ultimately displace the conventional traction-engine and its heavy trailing waggons? Every municipality and County Council is only too painfully cognisant of the dire effects upon the roads exercised by the cumbrous wheels of these unwieldy locomotives and trains. With the Renard train, however, the trailing coaches can be of light construction, carried on ordinary wheels which do not cut up or otherwise damage the roadway surface. Many other advantages inherent in such a train might be enumerated. The most important, however, are the flexibility of the whole train; its complete control; faster speed without any attendant danger; its remarkable braking arrangements as afforded by the continuous propeller shaft gearing directly with the driving-wheels of each carriage; its low cost of maintenance, serviceability, and instant use; and the reduction in the number of men requisite for the attention of the train while on a journey."
Were the system a success, it would find plenty of scope to convey passengers and commodities through districts too sparsely populated to render a railway profitable. People would talk about travelling or sending goods by the "ten-thirty motor train," just as now we speak of the "eleven-fifteen to town."
As a carrier and distributer of mails, the motor van has already established a position. To quote but a couple of instances, there are the services between London and Brighton, and Liverpool and Manchester. In the Isle of Wight motor omnibuses connect all the principal towns and villages. Each bus is a travelling post-office in which, by an arrangement with the Postmaster-General, anybody may post letters at the recognised stopping-places or whenever the vehicle has halted for any purpose.
In Paris, London, Berlin, the motor mail van is a common sight. It has even penetrated the interior of India, where the Maharajah of Gwalior uses a specially fitted steam car for the delivery of his private mails. And, as though to show that man alone shall not profit by the new mode of locomotion, Paris owns a motor-car which conveys lost dogs from the different police-stations to the Dogs' Home! In fact, there seems to be no purpose to which a horse-drawn vehicle can be put, which either has not been, or shortly will be, invaded by the motor.