In previous chapters I have shown that the first great highway for the citizens of London passing from one part of the capital to another was the River Thames; that the livelihood of the watermen became imperilled by the competition successively of private carriages, hackney coaches, and cabriolets, or "cabs"; and that these, in turn, had afterwards to face the competition of omnibuses. A still further development, leading to competition with the omnibuses, was brought about by the re-introduction of the tramway, for the purposes of street transport.
It was in the United States that street tramways first came into vogue, and it was by an American, George Francis Train, that the pioneer tramway of this type in England was laid at Birkenhead at the end of the '50's. A few other short lines followed, and some were put down—without authority—in certain parts of London, only, however, to be condemned as a nuisance on account of the hindrance to other traffic. It was not until 1868 that lines laid in Liverpool secured public favour for the innovation. Fresh tramways were laid in London between 1869 and 1871, and others followed in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dublin and elsewhere.
All the early lines were operated by horses; but various expedients were resorted to with the idea both of obtaining greater speed and of carrying more persons at comparatively less cost. Among these expedients were steam locomotives and underground cables, the latter for cars furnished with a grip attachment conveying to them the movement of the cables, as operated by machinery at a central dep?t. The greatest impetus to the street tramway system came, however, with the application of electricity as the motive power.
The first line opened on the "trolley" system of overhead {454}wires, conveying electric current to the cars, was in Kansas City in 1884. Electric tramways were tried in Leeds in 1891, and the system was afterwards adopted in many other towns. Underground conduit and surface-contact systems were also employed, with a view to avoiding overhead wires, to which widespread objection was, especially at first, entertained; but the latter system has been the one generally adopted.
Development of the tramway system in England was slow on account, not of any lack of enterprise on the part of business men, but of the discouraging nature of tramway legislation.
Just about the time when the original horse tramways began to come into vogue certain local authorities were cherishing strong grievances against the gas and water companies in their districts. They complained that the charges of these companies were extortionate and that the terms they asked, when invited to dispose of their undertakings to the said local authorities, were excessive. The companies, nevertheless, controlled the situation because their Parliamentary powers represented a permanent concession, and because, also, they were able to fix their own price in any negotiations upon which they might be invited to enter.
When the introduction of another public service, in the form of street tramways, seemed likely to create still another "monopoly," it was thought desirable to prevent the tramway companies from attaining to the same position as that of the gas and water companies. Powers were accordingly granted to enable the local authorities, if they so desired, to acquire the undertakings, at the end of a certain period, on terms which would be satisfactory to themselves, at least.
It was motives such as these that inspired some of the main provisions of the Tramways Act of 1870, the full title of which is "An Act to Facilitate the Construction and to Regulate the Working of Tramways"; though in a statement presented to a Committee on Electrical Legislation of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, in 1902, the late Sir Clifton Robinson, manager of the London United Tramways Company, declared that "if it had been described as an Act to discourage the construction of tramways it would have better described the action of some of its clauses."
The Act did, undoubtedly, confer certain advantages on {455}tramway promoters, as well as on local authorities, since it abolished the obligation previously devolving upon them to obtain—as in the case of a railway company—a Private Bill in respect to each fresh line they desired to construct. It authorised them to apply, instead, to the Board of Trade for a Provisional Order which, on its formal confirmation by Parliament, would have all the force of a Private Act. In this way the procedure was both simplified and rendered less costly.
On the other hand, the Act of 1870 laid down (1) that the assent of the local and road authorities to a new line of tramway should be obtained; though where the assent of authorities in respect to two-thirds of the mileage was secured the Board of Trade might dispense with that of any other objecting authority; (2) that the frontagers were also to have a power of veto; (3) that the original concession should be granted for a period of twenty-one years only; and (4) that at the end of such period, or at the end of any subsequent period of seven years, the local authorities should have the option of acquiring the tramway at the "then value" of the plant, without any allowance for compulsory purchase, goodwill, prospective profits or other similar consideration.
So long as these provisions applied to horse tramways only, the companies may not have found them specially oppressive, inasmuch as there was still a prospect of their being able to make a profit within the twenty-one-year period before they were compulsorily bought out at "scrap-iron" rates, while they could expect to realise the value of their stock of horses; though, in effect, the statutory obligations meant, even then, that towards the end of their tenure the tramway company did not spend a single shilling on the line more than was absolutely necessary to keep it in working order until the day of their eviction arrived, generally grudging even a coat of paint for the cars and refraining from any avoidable labour on the roadway. Individuals, and especially foreign visitors, unacquainted with the facts of the case, might well have considered some of the old tramway systems a discredit to the country.
When electric traction for tramway operation was introduced, there was a natural expectation on the part of the British public that the tramway companies would adopt it {456}in place of horse traction. The companies were hampered, however, by the Act of 1870, which remained in force though a complete revolution in the conditions of street rail-transport was being brought about.
The substitution of electricity for horse-power meant (1) the provision of power stations, sub-stations and new car dep?ts; (2) the fixing of overhead wires, together with fresh track-work, in the streets; (3) the use of a heavier type of car; and (4) the running of a much more frequent service, since only under these conditions can an electric tramway possibly be made to pay. All these things involved a very substantial increase in the capital outlay, and companies may well have hesitated to incur so great an expense with the prospect of only a twenty-one years' tenure before them; while the position was even more hopeless in the case of companies whose tenure had already half expired.
The dissatisfaction of the public when they found that the tramway system of the country was not being brought up to date, and compared most unfavourably with tramway systems abroad, gave to the local authorities an apparent justification both for providing and for operating tramways as a special phase of municipal enterprise. At the time the Act of 1870 was passed it was assumed that, although local authorities might construct or acquire tramways, they would certainly lease them to private companies to operate.[61] In proportion, however, as the movement for municipal enterprise developed, local authorities were the more inclined to operate tramways in addition to owning them. There was no general Act giving them authority so to do, but the difficulty was overcome by the insertion in Local Bills of clauses giving to the local bodies promoting the Bills power to operate their own tramways, the reason advanced being that there were difficulties in the way of leasing the lines to companies on satisfactory conditions.
Matters were not left entirely in the hands of the municipalities, various tramway companies having sought, as their twenty-one years' tenure came to a close, to make such arrangements as would warrant an adaptation of their existing {457}system to electric traction; while other companies applied for powers to construct new lines or extensions of lines on the same system. Parliament had certainly sanctioned a longer period of tenure than twenty-one years when the promoters could make an arrangement to this effect with the local authorities concerned; and it was hardly likely that a company would incur the great expense of constructing an entirely new tramway, with electrical installation and other requirements all complete, unless they had some guarantee of a longer tenure than the statutory period. But these very factors enabled the local authorities concerned to control the situation; and their power to exercise this control was made still more complete by the operation of Standing Order No. 22, which applied to Private Bills for tramway schemes requirements similar to those of the Tramways Act as regards the obligation on promoters to obtain the assents of local and road authorities.
These authorities had thus an absolute veto over any new tramway schemes, and such veto might finally rest in the hands of a single local authority, controlling a sparsely populated section of the proposed mileage, yet having, perhaps, the controlling voice in being the one authority whose approval was needed to make up the requisite two-thirds.
There had been some expectation on the part of tramway promoters that the general position would be improved by the Light Railways Act, 1896, many light railways being indistinguishable from tramways. Under this Act the assent of the local and road authorities is not required, and the frontagers' veto was done away with by it in the case of light railways; but authority to oppose was given to railway companies, and in practice the Light Railway Commissioners held that they ought not to authorise a tramway as a light railway unless it connected the area of one local authority with another. For these and other reasons the Act was not so beneficial in regard to tramways as had been anticipated.
In the case of tramway companies it became a matter either of paying to the local authorities the "price" they asked for their assent, or else seeing the schemes fail at the start, without any chance of having them even considered on their merits. How local authorities have used—or abused—the power of control thus possessed by them is suggested by some remarks {458}made by Mr Emile Garcke in an article published in "The Times Engineering Supplement" of July 25, 1906, where he says:—
"The right of veto is exercised not so much with the desire to destroy a projected enterprise, but rather to exact the utmost conditions which a promoter will accept sooner than abandon the project. When a scheme is proceeded with in spite of these exactions it is taken as evidence that the conditions imposed have not been exacting enough; and whenever the operating company has occasion subsequently to ask the local authority to approve anything, the company is expected to offer more than commensurate consideration, although the object for which the approval is desired may be primarily for the benefit of the public. All these obstacles imply increased capital outlay or increased working costs, and perhaps both. If, notwithstanding these conditions, the company earns a moderate profit, it is accused of striving only after dividends to the prejudice of the public. If non-success of the enterprise follows, then the company is accused of being over-capitalised and mismanaged, and it has come to be considered an impertinence for a company to offer ever so mild a protest."
On the same subject it is stated in "The Dangers of Municipal Trading," by Robert P. Porter (1907):—
"The use of the veto has had disastrous effects on private enterprise. In many districts it has led to utter stagnation of personal initiative. Good schemes have been barred by local authorities out of pure caprice or prejudice. Other schemes have been allowed to proceed under barely tolerable conditions; the undertaking has been crippled from the start by the high price municipalities have exacted for their consent. Others, again, have been withdrawn by the promoter because he found it impossible to agree to the extortionate demands of the governing bodies."
Mr Porter quotes various authorities who have expressed strong views on the subject of the veto.
The chairman of the Parliamentary Committee which considered a scheme of tramways promoted in Scotland said: "The Committee desire to put on record that in their opinion the original scheme was a good one, and calculated to be of much use to the district; but it has been so mutilated and loaded with conditions by conflicting interests and the {459}excessive demands of several local bodies that it now appears to the Committee to be wholly unworkable."
In 1902 Mr Chaplin, at one time President of the Local Government Board, stated that "what local authorities would describe as conditions are regarded by promoters—and very often, no doubt, with good reason—as neither more nor less than blackmail. This has been the subject of great complaint for years, and I do not think I should be going too far if I said that on several occasions it has led to considerable scandals."
Lest these expressions of opinion may be considered unduly severe by any reader unacquainted with the facts, I turn for some definite data to the "Exhibit to Proof of Evidence," handed in by Sir Clifton Robinson to the Royal Commission on London Traffic when he was examined before that body in 1904.[62]
In the early days of his company (the London United), the local authorities, Sir Clifton said, "had not, perhaps, fully recognised their opportunity," and the company got their assents comparatively cheaply under their first Act in 1898.
Two years later the price they had to pay for the assents of local authorities to a group of tramways in the Twickenham, Teddington and Hampton district was ￡202,000, or ￡16,000 a mile. The requirements imposed on the company took the form of "wayleaves" and of street improvements, the greater part of the latter being entirely apart from the actual needs of the tramway. The improvements in Heath Road, Twickenham, giving a 45-ft. roadway, cost for properties and works alone some ￡30,000. A like sum had to be spent in Hampton and Hampton Wick, where the work done included the setting back of the entire frontage of the Royal Deer Park of Bushey.
In 1901 the company sought for powers to construct twelve miles of tramway in Kingston-upon-Thames and neighbourhood. On this occasion the "concessions" wrung from {460}them by the local authorities amounted to ￡66,000 for street improvements, ￡20,000 for bridges, and a further ￡68,000, capitalised value of annual payments for so-called "wayleaves." This made a total of ￡154,000, or ￡12,800 per mile, merely for assents to the construction of their lines. The details of the account included a sum of ￡1500 extorted by an urban district council as "a contribution towards some town improvement, not necessarily on the company's proposed line of route, but anywhere in their district the council might desire."
One item to which the company had to agree in 1902, before they could obtain an Act authorising them to build another thirteen miles of tramway, was the construction at Barnes of an embankment and terrace along the river side. It made a very pleasant promenade, and was certainly an addition to the amenities of the neighbourhood; but it cost the tramway company ￡40,000. The "price" of local authorities' assents for these thirteen miles of line worked out thus: Street improvements (properties and works), ￡72,000; Barnes Boulevard, ￡40,000; "wayleaves" (capitalised), ￡100,000; a total of ￡412,000, or ￡31,600 per mile.
Altogether, in the four years, 1898-1902, the total expenditure of the company on street and bridge improvements in respect to less than fifty miles of tramway amounted to ￡745,000; and although, to a certain extent, the widenings, etc., were necessary for electric tramway purposes, "the bulk of the expenditure under this head," Sir Clifton declared, "was undertaken with a view to conciliate the local authorities, or was forced upon us by them as the 'price of their assents.'" To this ￡745,000 was to be added ￡241,000, the capitalised value, at five per cent, of the "wayleaves" the company had also agreed to pay, making a total of ￡986,500, irrespective altogether of the cost of construction and equipment of the lines.
When, in 1904, the company proposed to construct still another twenty-one miles of tramway in the western suburbs of London, "they recognised their obligations to the local and county authorities," Sir Clifton said, by proposing to undertake street, road and bridge widenings which would have cost them ￡217,932. They thought this a sufficiently generous "price" to pay for permission to provide the district with {461}improved transport facilities. Instead of being satisfied, the local authorities made demands which would have involved the company in a further expenditure of ￡642,630, making a total of ￡860,562. One urban district council included in its demands the construction by the tramway company of public lavatories and a subway. In a district where the company were prepared to spend ￡30,000 on road improvements the county council demanded a carriageway of forty feet and wood paving throughout six and a half miles of country roads, involving the expenditure of a further ￡30,000.
Rather than submit to all these exactions the company abandoned their Bill. They had already abandoned sixty miles of proposed tramway extensions "owing," said Sir Clifton, "to the demands or the uncompromising attitude of the local authorities," although many of these lines would have been valuable connections with the existing tramway system, and would have served in no small degree the traffic needs of the districts concerned.
"It is not too much to say," added Sir Clifton Robinson, in concluding his statement, "that instead of giving such proposals sympathetic consideration, if not practical encouragement, the attitude assumed by the average local authority of to-day is one of hostility, inspired by a desire to extort the uttermost farthing from promoters."
In the face of experiences, or the prospect of experiences, such as these, many would-be promoters of tramway enterprise developed a natural reluctance to put their own money, or to try to induce other people to put theirs, into the business; and even some American financiers, who thought we were much too slow in tramway matters in this country, and came over here with the combined idea of showing us how to do things and of exploiting us to their own advantage, abandoned their plans and went home again when they got to understand the bearing of our legislative enactments on the situation.
So, as time went on, the local authorities had greater excuse than ever for constructing the tramways themselves; and most of the principal urban centres built lines of their own, sooner or later.
That there have been certain resemblances between State policy towards the railways and State policy towards the {462}tramways may have been already noticed by the reader. Just as the one was primarily based on suspicion and distrust due to the earlier action of the canal companies, so was the other inspired by what were regarded as the shortcomings of gas and water companies. Just, also, as the local authorities, while not aiding the railways at all, were given authority to levy an abnormal taxation on them, so have they been given a free hand to exploit the tramway companies in making them pay a heavy price for assents to their enterprises. The story of tramways, again, like that not only of railways but of canals and of turnpike roads, shows the same early lack of centralised effort with a view to securing a national system; and this piecemeal growth of tramways, rather than of a tramway system, was, undoubtedly, fostered in proportion as (1) discouragement was given to private companies, which could have operated without respect to borough boundaries and county areas, and (2) tramway ............