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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0757.PDF
FLIGHT, 3 June 1960 765 Masefield on Air Transport's Future POINTS FROM A ROYAL SOCIETY OF ARTS LECTURE THE air transport business has now been built up to asubstantial size. During 1959—air transport's fortieth year—there were some 96 million individual passenger journeys on airlines of the western world, and some 60,000m passengermiles were flown—an average journey distance of a little more than 600 miles for each passenger. Passenger traffic accounted forsome 78 per cent of the total revenue load ton miles operated, cargo and baggage for some 17 per cent, and mail for the remainingfive per cent. Thus air transport is distinct from almost all other forms of transport in that passenger traffic and passenger revenuepredominates. At sea 86 per cent of the revenue comes from cargo. Freight traffic on the railways accounts for 74 per cent of itsincome. Even on the roads goods loads account for 48 per cent of the revenue earned by public transport services. Although passenger traffic represents the major preoccupationof the world's airlines, even in these times of 100- to 180-passenger jet aircraft cruising at up to 600 miles an hour the averagenumber of passengers carried in each aircraft is only 31 (at 58 per cent passenger load factor, in an average of 53 seats availablein each aircraft), while the average cruising speed achieved on all the world's airlines in 1959 was 217 miles an hour. On the cost side, world air transport is working out at some56 pence for each load ton-mile operated—or just over fivepence a passenger mile. By comparison with other forms of transport, ona capacity ton-mile basis, estimated figures work out as follows: Air, 35.0 pence per c.t.m. at 217 m.p.h.; road, 4.0 pence per c.t.m.at 20 m.p.h.; rail, 1.5 pence per c.t.m. at 20 m.p.h.; sea, 0.15 pence per c.t.m. at 15 m.p.h. There seems no doubt, now, that the supersonic transportaeroplane—cruising somewhere between 1,500 m.p.h. and 2,000 m.p.h.—will be a reality before the 1960s are over, and that it willbe a major factor from the decade of the 1970s onwards. There seems, equally, little doubt that—for long-range operations—thesupersonic transport will be an economic proposition at fares com- parable to those which prevail today. For short and mediumranges it is much less attractive on grounds of cost and noise. Short-range inter-city services are, however, best suited to thedevelopment of the large helicopter. A major advantage of this form of vehicle is its ability to cut out the slow and frustratingjourney from city-centre to airport by flying directly from city- centre to city-centre. The large helicopter of the next decadeseems likely to turn out to be reasonably economic only for distances of between 100 and 250 miles. But before it can be usedsatisfactorily the noise problem has to be overcome. In this direction the type of transmission which depends upon a formof jet propulsion from the tips of the rotor blades—such as is used on the Rotodyne—is much less easy to make tolerable than the"twiddle-in-the-middle" form of transmission from turbine engines driving rotors through shafts. Now that all Britishhelicopter development is centred under one company's control, concentration on the most tolerable solution may, in due course,be easier to achieve. Scope for Medium Hauls A study made recently in the US showed that 57 per cent ofall passengers travelled for journeys of less than 50 miles; 18 per cent between 50 and 100 miles; 15 per cent between 100 and 250miles (this is the helicopter field); 6 per cent between 250 and 500 miles; 2.5 per cent between 500 and 1,000 miles; 1 per centbetween 1,000 and 1,500 miles; 0.5 per cent more than 1,500 miles. In the area of journeys of between 250 miles and 1,500 miles—the medium-haul fixed-wing field—54m passengers (10 per cent of the total travellers by all forms of transport) moved in theU.S.A.in 1959. That is some 15 times the total traffic which crossed the Atlantic by sea and air in the same year.These medium-haul sector distances over which the helicopter is not suitable, and the supersonic transport potentially very expen-sive, represent some of the most lucrative future fields for air trans- port and the best field for the future exploitation of the economicsubsonic jet—probably, in the next decade, powered with ducted- fan low-consumption engines. A feature of air transport is the fact that even the smallernations consider that their national prestige must be served by the operation of an international airline, often across the majoroceans of the world into the bigger traffic centres such as London, New York, Paris and Rome. A natural—and uneconomic—corollary of this is the tendency to negotiate restrictive traffic agreements so that traffic is more or less forced to fly in equalproportions by the national carrier and its foreign reciprocal, regardless of the respective efficiencies, records and attractionsof the different airlines. THE author, Peter Masefield, was until recentlymanaging director of Bristol Aircraft, and is a former chief executive of BEA. He was at onetime UK civil air attache in Washington. The lecture, given on May 25, was entitled "TheProblems and Prospects of Air Transport." These restrictive practices—usually by limitation of frequenciesand by the denial of the so-called fifth freedom rights to airlines of third countries, seems to be on the increase rather than thereverse. Such a policy results in the pernicious doctrine of the "roped-off seat." The problem is certain to get more acute whenthe era of the supersonic transport arrives. Small nations will not be able to afford aircraft costing, perhaps, £4 million each. Ifrecent history is a guide, they may attempt to ban competitive supersonic services, except at very high premium fares, or theymay insist that such services are restricted to a small proportion of the traffic demands. In either case the best interests of thetravelling public are not being served. If international air transport politics present a problem, some ofthe domestic issues are no less acute. In the United Kingdom, for example, the issue of how to provide a satisfactory arrangementunder which the State corporations and the independent ones can live happily together remains unresolved. On this subject succes-sive governments have known the precise psychological moment when to say nothing—and have continued to say it. The fact isthat the State Corporations—BEA and BOAC—were set up to perform a particular job of carrying air traffic over designatedroutes at a profit and any undermining of their opportunities is liable to be looked upon as a betrayal of a trust. Hope for Better Things Quite obviously, the device of making independent companies"associates" of the corporations has not worked and could do no more than patch up an unsatisfactory situation. The projected AirTransport Licensing Board, with the means of making a full and impartial assessment of the economic and the public interestaspects of route allocations and competitive aspects, may well turn out to be a means of working out a practical solution whichhas so far eluded British air transport politics. We may hope for better things. Air transport is not, however, showing the profitable resultsfor which its advocates have hoped for so long. Some airlines will face a battle for survival. More mergers in airlines, as well asmanufacturers, seem certain. The chief reason for recent poor economic results is that therate of re-equipment for the jet age has been outstripping the -financial resources available. Air transport as a whole would be ina much more healthy situation, economically, had the jet age been postponed for five years or so. The lesson may be learned for the decade ahead. Existing jetaircraft will be written down to relatively low book values before 1970 when the next major step in re-equipment can be expected.On medium range services, developments of present aircraft will probably provide the most satisfactory answer. Thus an improvingsituation can be looked for in the years ahead. Such revolutionary new vehicles as the Hovercraft or VTOLjet will not, in my view, be likely to play any significant part in commercial air transport during the 1960s. The Hovercraft is, inreality, a displacement vehicle—like a ship or a motor car—rather than a lifting aircraft. It uses the air as a cushion to reducefriction, but in all other respects can be considered a means of surface transport. And, in the development stage at least, it willremain slower than modern aircraft and more expensive to operate than other surface craft. The VTOL jet will not be likely to come into service for com-mercial air transport during the next decade because of its high operating cost and high noise level. One thing should never be forgotten about commercial airtransport—and, indeed, about commercial transport of any kind. That is that the purpose of transport is to serve the community inthe widest sense—that public interest transcends private interest, that public accountability has to be married to individual enter-prise and that "full information" is the best guarantee of sound intentions. Commercial aviation—above all other means of trans-port—has immense prospects for the future. Its wise public regu- lation and its imaginative private development must be relatedin full proportion to gain the results which all the world hopes from it.
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