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Aviation History
1933
1933 - 1138.PDF
FLIGHT, DECEMBER 7, 1938 cars. Recent developments of the Autogiro may suggest the abolition of even the necessity for large landing grounds. At the same time, we must not forget that the railways have begun to enlist the help of air transport. The Bristol Channel has been found to be a case where it is better to send passengers across by air than to adopt any other expedient. Private enterprise has not hesitated to tackle the Solent and the river Humber, and if only an aero plane could be produced which could carry a motor car cheaply for a short distance, there should be good hopes of profit in a ferry service across the Firth of Forth. We may come to that yet—who knows?—that is to say, providing the motor car contrives to survive the coming universal popularity of the aeroplane. All aircraft, however, must deal with at least two elements, while amphibians deal with three. Flights must begin and end on either land or water. Since the flying clubs began to get active in Great Britain a lament has been going up to the heavens that the activities of the private pilot, even in fine weather, are circumscribed by the paucity of the landing grounds. Private flying is still only in its infancy, and it will increase rapidly in the next few years. Internal commercial flying is still in its cradle, but it too is beginning to show promise of healthy growth. Both of these children need aero dromes, or at least landing grounds, spread about the country. It is quite time that something con structive was done in this matter. The most distinguished, and certainly one of the most enthusiastic, of our private owners is the Prince of Wales. It is common knowledge that he thoroughly enjoys flying, and it is an open secret that he is a good deal more than a novice at hand ling the joystick. With His Royal Highness enjoy ment is always made the handmaid of business, and he uses the air for travel not so much because he likes it as because it saves his very valuable time, and allows him to get through more work than he could possibly do if he were to use older and slower means of travel. When, therefore, he opens the Airports Conference to-morrow at the Mansion House, and voices, as presumably he will do, the call for more aerodromes in Great Britain, he will speak with a personal knowledge of the subject, such as cannot be behind him in all the speeches which he makes in the course of a year. Of one thing everyone may always feel assured, and that is that His Royal Highness never gives his personal support to any movement without having the most careful inquiries made and having assured himself that the cause is a worthy one. Even if he were not a private owner of aircraft himself, his presence at the Conference would be a guarantee of its merits and its import ance. The resolutions of such a Conference can be brushed aside by no one. It is because of the unusual importance of this Conference that FLIGHT has decided to make the subject of airports the special feature of the present issue, and the articles which we publish from various contributors, all well qualified to speak on the sub ject, may clear away some of the undergrowth and help even the delegates to the Conference to get to grips straightway with the big trees. There was another Conference on airports held in London some few years ago, in which there was much talking, but we venture to think that many delegates went home from it with no very clear ideas in their heads as to what would really be the best thing to do. Perhaps that Conference, like the Glasgow-Belfast air services, was somewhat before its time. Things have certainly altered in the meantime, and the situation is now very much more developed. Not only have aircraft been improved, and not only has the initial hesita tion to fly largely died out, but of late an energetic house-building movement has laid its desirable, but not very beautiful, mark on the outskirts of most of our large towns and even of many of our villages. It is now very much more certain than it was four or five years ago that most towns of any size will really need airports, and it is also clear that if they do not take prompt steps they will be unable to reserve land for airports except at such a distance from the centre of the town that the speed of aircraft will be largely nullified by the time spent on ground travel. Perhaps another reason why the earlier Conference did not effect much was that the ideas expressed at it were for the most part too ambitious. The idea seemed to be that every town ought to regard it as a duty to itself and to the country at large to set up a pretty fair imitation of Croydon. Naturally, even ambitious Mayors and Corporations shrank from spending the ratepayers' money to that extent, when the prospects of the town reaping concrete benefits from the possession of such an airport were so very nebulous. We are more modest and more business like now. We do say that the future may well exceed our present expectations. The time may well come when elaborately-equipped airports will be a sine qua non of prosperity with any town of reasonable size. In those future days, perhaps, the proverbial Upper Puddlington-on-Mud may regard the present equipment of Croydon as crudely mediaeval. We must not forget such a possibility, and the measures taken now should provide for expansion if and when that should become necessaty. But, as some of our contributors point out, for many towns the urgent need of the moment is only to secure a site, and to keep it clear of surrounding buildings. For others, it will be wise to level the landing ground and establish a petrol pump and a telephone. Others will very soon, or even now, find it advisable to set up comfortable waiting rooms for passengers and to see that adequate ground transport is available. Airports may prove to be like Government rail ways in some parts of the Empire. They may, con ceivably, never pay dividends themselves, and yet they may so develop the locality that to dispense with them would be ruin. The cities and towns must look ahead to the time when business men and pleasure-seekers will mainly travel by air, and must ask themselves whether it will pay them to attract such people to their city, and whether they can afford to see them pass it by. We know that many city fathers have already been scratching their heads over the problem of whether to secure an airport site or not. They are certainly not to be blamed for their hesitation, for hitherto guidance has not been easy to secure. We have no doubt that the matter will be made clear to them to-morrow at the Airports Conference at the Mansion House. 1210
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