Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1942-11-29
By JACQUES FUTRELLE, Jr.,
Travel Editor.


Intriguing are the dreams of post
war travel. And varied, too. Not
that as soon as peace becomes an
actual right of the world again
series of innovations will outmode
travel as the American public knew
it before the war established priori-
ties on planes, damned trains and
buses and eclipsed the automobile
as long distance pleasure vehicle.
But the pickup will begin at the
wars end.
From time to time stories in the
daily and technical press have led
the public to expect strides as great
in railroad transportation as the
streamline train of the early 1905,
super planes adapted from Army use
to passenger transportation and au-
tomobiles that embody wondrous de-
sign and gadgets,
Something such as these pictures
are envisioned and limited at in the
story The Future of Transporta-
ton" recently~released by the Ma
tional Resources Planning Board
With no doubt the advantage of
glance behind the scenes of auto
mobile research, the forecast on
transportation confirms the expec-
tency of some striking developments
in the family bus. Yet. given vote
of new type of pleasure car or an
expanded system of highways, the
public no doubt would approve the
latter first.
1t probably won't come in the
preferred order Strange looking
cars probably will fill the highways,
competing with new and ponderous
| trucks long before roads are de-
veloped with capacity to reduce the
summer Sunday evening jam, let us
say, from Maryland's Solomons
Island and North Beach into Wash
! ington. Not even a major economic
depression can break that long line
of delayed and impatient cars, pro-
vided there are tires and gas enough.
Taking a flyer into predicting
what the automobile of the peace
decade will look like, the report
says:
important developments in pri-
vate passenger car transportation
may be expected through the safety,
comfort and economy attainable by
Improvements in car design. The
conventional automobile of today
! is still but a stage in the evolution
| from horse and buggy: and the need
is not merely for a thoroughly mod
ern automobile. but one which can
be owned and operated at a cost fat
! lower than at present.
Placing automobile engines IN
the rear, practice which has been
successful in bus design, promises to
provide more inside space, greater
safety and considerable economies
in material, and the development
of polarized light for headlights will
permit greater night driving comfort
and safety.
The current conversion of the
automobile industry to war produc-
ton will eventually give way to a
new beginning in automo i've design.
With extensive output of small pri-
vate planes, moreover. there will be
considerable incentive to design a
car which can compete successfully,
and which will be economical and
properly adapted to the problems
of short-run urban transport for
which the automobile is peculiarly
| fitted" ar tsE
Conceding that the modern truck
is at times slow and mars vacation
and weekend driving, the report
suggests building around" the
problem. Calling up wide vision
and contemplating almost unlimited
funds with which to solve all trans
portation realistically, the board
goes beyond the expediency that
proved such a boon to motorists in
Wisconsin.
Building up tourist business,
Wisconsin experimental and later
established a policy each summer of
practically eliminating truck traffic
/ from the highways over the week
ends. Thus, highway space, before
the present governmental spree of
rationing, was apportioned almost
/ exclusively to pleasure driving. The
plan was a great success for the
Sunday driver, tourist as we'll as
native.
The transportation study recogs
nizes specifically one of the failings
of numbering trucks on hills, as