ABSTRACT
The most obvious place for road transport to encroach on rail was in short-distance work, especially across country, and in collection and delivery from stations. Steam lorries cost much more per hour than horse transport and so delays or waiting times were crucial. Even by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century, then, motor transport was making a distinct impression on the economics of business firms by allowing the already-mentioned widening of the effective trading area. The general picture, then, in the decade leading up to the First World War, was of a gradually expanding road haulage industry. Though road motors meant competition for the railways, some of the companies soon learnt that road transport had its merits. They quickly started using motors for collection and delivery work at the bigger stations and in some areas they used motors instead of undertaking the much greater expense of building branch lines or even the much-discussed light railways.
