ABSTRACT
By 1870 the integration of separate local market areas intoone nation-wide market had already been carried a longway. Persistent improvements in inland transport throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries had encouraged more and more of the country to rely less than before on the produce of the immediate vicinity for the maintenance of most of its life: and the growth of industry had necessitated a constant increase in the movement of both materials and finished goods between distant localities. The change was a gradual one, limited by the speed and capacity of the means of transport; but from the eighteen-thirties, and especially after 1850, the operation of railways enabled it to develop far more radically. In the 'fifties and 'sixties railways, supplemented by a better postal service (which they helped to make possible) and by the development of a telegraphic service (in which also they had a notable part), brought up the inter-regional exchange of goods to a level previously undreamt of and established the habit of passenger travel among a much bigger proportion of the community than ever before. Yet by 1870 they had not nearly exhausted the possibilities of expansion. Dependence on imported supplies, paid for by exports, both of which had to be carried between the ports and inland centres of production and consumption, had not reached its maximum. Urbanization, which necessarily involved bringing in supplies from outside, was still increasing. The populace was growing rapidly in both numbers and wealth. Those who had wished to have as little as possible to do with the new-fangled ways brought by the railways were beginning to die off and to be replaced by a generation with more taste for variety and movement, and often more money to indulge it. And there were still many to be familiarized for the first time with the possibility of travel as a regular element of life instead of an occasional joyous adventure. Nevertheless, though the opportunities to enlarge the business of transport might seem boundless, the history of transport from the eighteen-seventies to the First World War is best seen as a great
An extension of developments already well begun. Only towards the end of the period were there signs of something quite new emerging, and the effect of that was not strongly felt until later.
