Page:The Reshaping of British Railways (Beeching Report).pdf/60

 Factors which need mentioning in this connection are:—

Rationalisation of transport as a whole. Total social benefit, as distinct from immediate profit. Long-term trends in location of industry and population. Prevention of industrial growth by withdrawal of railway services.

Rationalisation of Transport as a Whole

Consideration of the best use of national resources will lead most people to the conclusion that some co-ordination of the various modes of transport is necessary. This view is bound to present itself very forcefully to those responsible for railways, which are especially vulnerable to uncontrolled development of transport capacity, because of their high fixed investment and their correspondingly high break-even level of traffic, Nevertheless, sound co-ordination must be based upon the use of each form of transport for those purposes for which it is the best available means, and, as has already been emphasised, all the changes proposed are directed towards making the railways best in fields where they clearly have the potential to be so, and towards withdrawing them from fields in which they are clearly not the best means of meeting the need. Between these two fields in which the case is black and white, there is a wide field over which the balances between road and rail, or rail and air, might be critically influenced by future changes in circumstances or legislation. But none of the present proposals penetrates into this field to the point of prejudicing future judgments.

Any deliberate influencing of the balance between different forms of transport, in future, is more likely to be in favour of the railways than against them. This would improve the financial position of the densely loaded main lines, and increase the proportion of intermediately loaded routes which could be made viable in future, but it could not, within the bounds of reason, he carried so far as to justify the network of lightly loaded routes which are to be closed.

Total Social Benefit

It might pay to run railways at a loss in order to prevent the incidence of an even greater cost which would arise elsewhere if the railways were closed. Such other costs may be deemed to arise from congestion, provision of parking space, injury and death, additional road building, or a number of other causes.

It is not thought that any of the firm proposals put forward in this Report would be altered by the introduction of new factors for the purpose of judging overall social benefit. Only in the case of suburban services around some of the larger cities is there clear likelihood that a purely commercial decision within the existing framework of judgment would conflict with a decision based upon total social benefit. Therefore, in those instances, no firm proposals have been made but attention has been drawn to the necessity for study and decision.

Long-Term Trends in the Location of Industry and Population

No novel assumptions have been made about the future distribution of population and industry in the country as a whole. Implicitly, it has been assumed that the pattern will continue to be basically similar to that which exists at present and that, while there may be a continuation or a reversal of