Examiner (Launceston, Tas. : 1900 - 1954), Friday 7 June 1929, page 11


NEW TRANSPORT METHOD Traders in England- who have once used, the "Container" system never return to other methods of transport, states the "Railway Newsletter." The English railway companies are, in fact, experiencing, difficulty in coping with the demand for containers, and a large number are being constructed in the railway workshops. The container is a box van, equally adaptable for transport by road, rail, or seat. Among other advantages, it ensures absolute door-to-door service, reduction, in handling costs, reduction in packing costs, minimum loss by damage, and minimum loss by theft. Goods which have already been successfully conveyed in containers reveal such widely differing commodities as furniture and confectionery, bricks, and flowers, radiators. and earthenware. The railways are also collaborating with experts in the meat trade in-the productione of an insulated container for the transport of meat under ideal conditions. The container operates on terms of equality with the commercial motor vehicle. It is equally mobile, if not more so, in that it is a separate unit from the chassis, and it has the advantage over the motor vehicle that it can also travel by rail. The absolute door-to-door service which the container enables the railways to offer is illustrated by the case in which a container loaded with building material was delivered to the third storey of a partially constructed building. The road-rail truck is attracting the world-wide attention of all interested in transport. An international container service between England

and the Continent is an accomplished fact. The Nord, Est and P.L.M. Railways of France are building containers of their own, and the last-named company has successfully operated a container service between Paris and Morocco. The container has taken a very definite place in the development of railway transport, and by means of it the railways are winning traffic back from the road. A year ago British railways possessed 350 containers; to day they own 2000. That is the tangible measure of the success of this new method of transport.