FOOTNOTES
[159] Chatburn’s “Highway Engineering,” Wiley & Sons, N. Y.
[160] Cf. “Root, Hog or Die,” by Philip Cabot, Atlantic Monthly, August, 1921.
[161] This estimate includes the following items:
| Heavy Car | Light Car | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 Drivers | $8.00-10.00 | $10.00 | per day | $10.00 |
| Tires | 4.00- 6.00 | 6.00 | 4.00 | |
| Oil, etc. | .75- 1.00 | 1.00 | .75 | |
| Gasoline | 3.50- 5.50 | 5.00 | 3.50 | |
| Depreciation | 4.00- 6.00 | 6.00 | 4.00 | |
| Interest | 1.00- 1.50 | 1.50 | 1.00 | |
| Insurance | 1.00- 1.50 | 1.50 | 1.00 | |
| Garage | .50- 1.00 | 1.00 | .50 | |
| License, taxes | .75- 1.50 | 1.50 | .75 | |
| Repairs | .50- 1.00 | .50 | .50 | |
| 24.00-35.00 | $34.00 | 26.00 | ||
[162] “Root, Hog, or Die: The New Englander and His Railroads,” by Philip Cabot, in Atlantic Monthly, August, 1921, p. 258.
[163] Wall Street Journal, August 26, 1921.
[164] The Railway Review, Chicago, July 30, 1921.
[165] W. Jett Lauck, a union-labor economist, in a report laid before the Railroad Labor Board, specifies the avoidable wastes as follows:
1. Modernizing locomotives.—Gross reparable deficiencies are pointed out which it is claimed might be avoided by the applications of improvements such as superheaters, brick arches, mechanical stokers, feed-water heaters, there would result an annual saving of at least $272,500,000.
2. Locomotive operation.—The magnitude of the railways’ coal bill is considered and certain of the larger wastes calculated, and it is concluded that by use of better methods of coal purchase, coal inspection, careful receipt, and efficient firing of the locomotives, an annual saving could be effected of at least $50,000,000.
3. Shop organization improvements.—The sad and almost incredible inadequacy and out-of-date equipment of the railway shops is reviewed, and defenseless wastes considered, and it is conservatively estimated that by a proper shop organization an annual saving could be effected of at least $17,000,000.
4. Power-plant fuel savings.—The obsolete and wasteful condition of the power plants in the railway shops is considered, and it is estimated that in this field the possible saving of fuel would by itself amount to an annual total of $10,000,000.
5. Water-consumption savings.—The railroads’ expenditure in maintenance of way and structure is reviewed, necessary wastes noted, and it is estimated that easily attainable savings in the consumption of water alone would amount annually to $12,600,000.
6. Service of supply savings.—The expenditure of the railways for supplies has been inquired into and the avoidable losses surveyed, and it is estimated that the wastes and abuses amount annually to not less than $75,000,000.
7. Shop accounting savings.—Attention has been given to the matter of uniform railroad statistics and the use of efficient methods of cost accounting. An annual saving would be feasible to the amount of $10,900,000.
8. Labor turn-over savings.—The industrial losses due to unnecessary labor turn-over and to inadequate training of personnel have been reviewed, and it is estimated that the avoidable wastes incident to labor turn-over alone amount to more than $40,000,000.
9. Loss and damage savings.—Inquiry has been made into the amount of the annual damage account of the railways and into preventable causes of such losses, and it is estimated that an annual saving might be effected to the amount of $90,000,000.
Other alleged losses, he says, would bring the total waste to over a billion.
[166] Report of the Joint Commission on Agricultural Inquiry.
CHAPTER VII
AUTOMOTIVE TRANSPORTATION
Automotive transportation is a matter of such recent growth that only a few of the elements entering it have as yet become fixed or standardized—the whole question is still in the experimental or growing stage. The next few years will probably see as many, if not as radical, changes in equipment and operation as have the past few. The law of evolution seems to include a period of slow growth or sort of weak feeling-out; then a period of very rapid growth, developing usually along several lines; and finally a ripening or fixing period in which standardization is reached. The automotive industries are now beginning the third period. Revolutionary changes are not to be expected, but there will be many minor ones seeking efficiency or economy. The machinery of transportation, the motor car and the roadway, are, perhaps, in a later stage of standardization than are the social and legal phases of the subject. The relative rights of the people on the street and driver of the car have yet to be determined. The relation between automotive transportation and the older forms of transportation is still in a very formative stage. Plans and organizations for operating systems of highway transport and methods of accounting which shall be fair to owner and patron have in a large measure yet to be developed.
These things must necessarily be true in a new and growing industry. Why, encyclopedias published in the ’eighties make no mention whatever of the motor car or automobile. In fact, the first practical automobiles were put on the market after 1893, and trucks were not sold as such until 1903, ten years later. This was about the period when automobiles were being made over by change of body into “business wagons.” But so rapidly has the use of the motor car grown, automobile registrations increasing from about one million in 1912 to more than eleven millions in 1922, that, so it is stated, 80 per cent of all cars manufactured are still in use.
Automotive transportation may be considered to include all conveyance from one place to another by means of motor vehicles. A motor vehicle is one which carries within itself the source of mechanical power which propels it providing that source be not muscular. This definition would include the tractor, the road roller, the torpedo, and the locomotive, which are ordinarily excluded. For the purposes of this discussion an automobile or motor car may be considered as a self-propelled vehicle which transports a burden other than itself as a weight upon its own wheels. This will exclude the tractor and the locomotive, which though self-propelled, are intended to draw other vehicles rather than to carry the load; also the road roller and the torpedo, which have no burden to transport other than their own weights. Some definitions would confine a motor vehicle to one designed to move on common roads or highways. However, motor cars are now being used on railroad tracks; they are entitled to and should be allowed the use of the name. The automobile may have as the source of power internal-combustion engines using such fuel as gasoline, kerosene, benzol, and alcohol; it may use steam generated by these fuels; or an electric storage battery charged by sources outside the engine may furnish the propelling force. The load transported will either be passenger or freight. Passenger traffic may be classified as business or pleasure. If a vehicle is used mostly for business, first cost and economy of operation may play a more important part in the purchase of the car than if used for pleasure, in which case appearance and luxurious appointments may be the deciding factor.
The Evolution of the Steam Automobile
- 1. The Cugnot Steam Carriage—1770.
- 2. The Trevithick & Vivian Steam Carriage—1801.
- 3. The Gurney Steam Carriage—1827.
- 4. The Church Automobile Carriage (Steam)—1833.
- 5. Gaillardit’s Steam Carriage—1894.
- (Courtesy of the Scientific American.)