The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1919-01-29
CURRENT COMMENT
Little Brother Of the Railroads.

Whatever may be the readjustment of
transportation, ii is reasonably safe
ophecy that the motor truck has tax
permanent place in the scheme of
lings as little brother to the freight
train Before the war, railway sys-
TENS looked with a cold eye al the motor
truck; it appeared in the unloyable as
peet Of rival, and it had the air Of
one who was not quite certain of what
could be done in the way of building
in on the transportation business, but
felt hopeful
Circumstances alter cases; the exigen-
cies of the war gave the little brother OPP
portunity to make himself useful in
many and sometimes quite unexpected
ed way. He began doing short-haul
business that the railroads would hith-
erto have done anything but encourage;
and the railways, having sidetracked the
competitive idea in order to give right
of way to service first, welcomed the
assistance, The motor truck became i'm
portant in keeping merchandise out of
congested terminals, in supplying factor
les with raw materials, in quickening es-
sential production, and in handling va
rious odds and ends of transportation
that the railways could no longer ex-
peditiously manage. In some states,
says a writer in The Railway Review,
the total tonnage carried over the high
ways increased in 1918 as much as 400
per cent. In Maryland, New Jersey,
eastern Pennsylvania and southern New
York the rural express developed rapidly
to a noteworthy efficiency. The motor
truck proved its ability to convey live.
stock to the yards in Cincinnati and
Omaha; in Massachusetts, it carried
hides to the shoe manufacturers, and
brought shoes away from them; 1t de-
livered machinery from Cincinnati to
New York, and groceries from Baltimore
to Washington; 1t played a useful part
in the coal situation, and many home
Is coaled this winter in consequence; it
conveyed cotton fabrics from Boston to
Akron and continued to the Pacific coast
With airplane tires, travelling night and
day with two drivers, one of them at
the wheel while the other slep in a
sleeping department on the truck. 1t
branched out further and became mo-
tor truck refrigerator capable of carry
ing $4,000 pounds of meat Some of these
activities are simply a beginning, find
ing out, under exceptional opportunities,
of what the motor truck can do as a
transportation agent,
All this is too interesting and success
full in the present, and too promising for
the future-to say nothing of involving
too much capital~-to be readily aban-
doned even If the railways should be able
to take over the new lines of business
that have been developed. But the rail
way policy, whatever it may be, can hardly
hope to escape some impress Of the ideas
along which it has been and for some
time yet will be conducted. The elimjna-
ton of competition between steam and
electric roads, waterways and highway
transportation has been a. definite pol
icy under the government, its primary
object being to secure efficiency during
the war--aud the efficiency secured will
in the long run be finally tested by the
degree to which it works in peace. Prac.
tically considered, the retention or modi-
fication of many things brought into be,
ing by war will depend upon their eco.
monte results under normal conditions,
For some time to.come the railways will
need the help that little brother has
been affording; and even if such were not
the case, one may shrewdly suspect that
little brother is already hig eonugh to
look out for himself, and that traffic
transportation by motor truck has come
to stay.-Boston Transcript.