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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 9, Issue 3 (June 1, 1934.)

Air Travel and the Railways

Air Travel and the Railways.

Air travel, the newest form of movement for mankind and mankind's belongings, is a subject which is at present engaging the serious attention of the Home railways. Last year one railway—the Great Western—commenced to operate air services for passengers between the Midlands and South Wales and certain holiday resorts in Devonshire. These services were tolerably well supported by the public, and during the present holiday season the experiment is being repeated. It cannot genuinely be said that air travel is really popular in Britain. Ninety-nine people out of a hundred frankly admit that “they feel safer on the ground,” and until such page 13 time as air travel secures the confidence of the public there does not seem much prospect for the operation of air routes by the Home railways.

One recalls that, in the infancy of the “Iron Way,” there was a good deal of timidity on the part of the public in entrusting themselves to the new form of movement. By degrees, however, rail travel lost its terrors, and it may quite well be that in course of time we shall all become air-minded to a degree. In any case, it is well that railways should not be unmindful of the progress of aerial transport, and if in years to come big scale air movement is realised, then nobody should be better able to engage in such transport than the railway undertakings. The probability is that in the years that lie ahead railways the world over will themselves operate air services in much the same manner as they now in many lands conduct transport by road and sea. For the present, however, railway-operated air services may be looked upon largely as an advertising “stunt.” The wisest course would seem to lie in wholehearted co-operation between railways and existing air-carrying concerns, and it is on these lines that development may be looked for during the next decade.