The Bozeman courier. (Bozeman, Mont.) 1919-1954, 1923-07-25
AUTO TOURIST TRAFFIC

In the comparatively few years since automobiles took to the
roads for long distance touring this traffic has become of real
Importance. In not more than ten years this travel has become
so common as to be unnoticed except for the numbers it is as
Stunning.
With so few years to guide in forecasting, who can say what
proportions this traffic will assume? What will the travel be ten
or twenty years from now? What will it be when the national
highways are paved or hard surfaced from coast to coast? Who is
able to judge the size of the interstate traffic that will wheel
through Montana over the Yellowstone Trail in 1910?
The estimates would be purely as to size, but that the num-
Der will total an army is a foregoing conclusion. AS a matter of
fact auto tourist travel has not more than fairly started in COM
|parison with what it will be in the years to come as this means
of long-distance travel becomes more common and more popular
and roads become better and better.
This forecasting leads to consideration of the commercial and
trade value of this traffic and the means that should be provided
to encourage 1T and draw from it the potential trade that it will
control. Considered from a trade standpoint. the auto Tourist
traffic when it reaches the numbers that it is destined to reach
IN the next twenty years, is due to be important. Compared to it.
except at resorts and terminals, rail traffic is as nothing.
Every legitimate means that can be taken to encourage this
traffic to stop in any city should not now be overlooked. Cities
should, and will in time, advertise to the world and especially TO
the auto tourists, that it invites these travellers. bids them .
hearty welcome, and hopes they will stay long. Some such adver-
Using now is done, but it is all in a very limited way over a very
limited territory.
For example it is not hard to imagine that western cities
soon Will be advertising in the east that they have the best tourist
camp in the state, with the most convenient facilities. etc. More
important than even printed advertising will be the good word of
the tourist who has stopped at such and such a city. It seems
unfortunate that in this early day of a growing business. Roze-
man should be getting a bad name by charging a paltry fifty cents
for the privilege of pitching a tent in the tourist grounds. That
Bozeman is getting the bad advertising from this source that the
Courier earlier predicted is now being proven. Bozeman bovs
working IN the park write home that the city is getting a bad
name because it charges tourists and yet furnishes nothing. It
IS a niggardy policy for which we shall yet pay dearly.
Tourist camps of ten or twenty years from now r r. baco,oo
institutions, and their maintenance part of every live citvs bud
get OF expense. About such camps, which will be elaborate and
wen provided VIII spring up shops, oiling stations and garages
catering primarily to the tourist trade. And such nlaces r. tbov
ne wide awake on service, will get the business.
In fact, as a general proposition, it is a foregone conclusion
enat tnose cities which provide best accommodation for auto tour
ISIS i tne future viii get the business. In the volume that is
coming, 1t will be well worth going after. How long is Bozeman
to run under the handicap of being a fifty cent town"