The Outlook 499 



PASSENGER RECEIPTS FROM 



YEAR. JOURNEYS. PASSENGERS. 







1907 . . 1,259,481,315 . . 42,102,007 



1908 . . 1,278,115,488 .. 42,615,812 



1909 . . 1,265,080,761 .. 41,950,188 



1910 . 1,306,728,583 .. 43,247,345 



These figures give evidence of, on the whole, a substantial 

 advance in railway passenger journeys and receipts, notwith- 

 standing all the competition of alternative facilities, and 

 we may assume that although tramways, motor-cars, motor- 

 omnibuses and even the latest new-comer, raillcss electric 

 traction, may supplement and more or less compete with the 

 railways, there is no suggestion that they are likely entirely 

 to supplant them for passenger travel. 



In the matter of goods transport in general, it is the fact 

 that during the last ten or fifteen years, more especially, there 

 has been an increasing tendency for the delivery of domestic 

 supplies to suburban districts or towns within an ever- 

 expanding radius of London and other leading cities to be 

 effected by road, instead of by rail. The same has been the 

 case in the distribution by wholesale houses of goods to 

 suburban shopkeepers, and, also, in the reverse direction, 

 in the sending of market-garden or other produce to central 

 markets. 



Where the railway companies have really created new 

 suburban districts through the running of specially cheap 

 workmen's trains, it may seem hard upon them that they 

 should be deprived of the goods transport to which such 

 districts give rise. 



The fact must be recognised, however, that when the dis- 

 tances are within, say, a ten-, a fifteen- or even a twenty-mile 

 radius, and when only small or comparatively small parcels 

 or consignments are to be carried, the advantages in econo- 

 mical transport may well be in favour of the road vehicle rather 

 than of the railway. The road vehicle can load up in the 

 streets as it stands opposite the wholesale trader's warehouse ; 

 it pays nothing for the use of the road ; it does not make any 

 special contribution to the police funds in recognition of 

 services rendered in the regulation of the traffic ; nor is it 

 taxed by the local authorities on the basis of the quantity of 



