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Show MOTOR TRUCK IS PROVING OF GREAT ADVANTAGE TO FARMERS IN HAULING U " -" r i 1 J - - K J f . r .... -v-wWS i j MotortrucK Owned Dy a Farmers' Co-operative Society. (Prepared by the United States Department of At; licul I urc. ) Transportation of farm products by motortruck lias Increased tremendously In tlie last few years, particularly in dairying and live stock regions. This development, moreover, lias not, with a few local exceptions, invaded tlie proper and profitable field of railroads,' says the .Department of Agriculture. Usually, It declares, motortrucks and railway service are complementary and not competitive. In a detailed study of the motortruck motor-truck situation the department says the motortruck has increased farm elli-clency, elli-clency, developed old markets and established now ones, speeded the conversion con-version of raw material Into finished products, facilitated marketing and distribution and made it possible for farmers to take advantage of variations varia-tions In demand at various markets. It has provided a service giving a complete com-plete movement from shipper to consignee con-signee without transfers or reloadiflgs. Good Example Cited. A good example is the transportation of hogs into the Indianapolis live stock-market. stock-market. In 1023 nearly one-third of the receipts of hogs at Indianapolis were delivered by highway, compared with less than 5 per cent In 1913. No fewer than 934,980 hogs were delivered by truck in Indianapolis in 1923. Within With-in a PO-mile radius of Indianapolis, 95 per cent of the hogs marketed are delivered de-livered by motortruck. There are scattering shipments from territory 75 to 100 miles away. For carload shipments ot hogs, rail transportation rates are generally cheaper than truck rates. Not many farmers, however, are in position to make carlot shipments. For the shipment ship-ment of smaller lots, the cost per head is often higher by rail than by truck, especially, when the barnyard to-stockyard to-stockyard service given by the truck Is taken into consideration. Shipment of hogs by truck has given producers direct access to central markets, mar-kets, where their stock is sold at the market price. This is an immense advantage ad-vantage over the situation formerly prevailing. It was common, before the day of good roads and the motortruck, for many hog raisers who marketed 20 or 30 head to sell their stock to a local buyer. This buyer assembled bogs In carload lots and traded on a wide margin. As he could not know when he would move his newly acquired ac-quired stock, he generally paid 75 cents to $1.25 below the market price. He also required the farmer to deliver his hogs at a point chosen for assembling as-sembling a carload. This method, with its obvious disadvantages disad-vantages to the fanner, has been entirely en-tirely changed by the motortruck. The local hog buyer has been eliminated within the trucking radius of Indianapolis. Indianap-olis. Farmers are now able, by watching watch-ing market prices, to take advantage of favorable price changes. Radio reports re-ports enable them to catch market openings, and ship their stock by truck to the yards before closing time. Studies cf Transportation. Studies of highway transportation n.ade by the department at Baltimore, Cincinnati, Detroit, Indianapolis. Milwaukee, Mil-waukee, Philadelphia. St. Paul and Minneapolis, showed that in all of these markets, with the exception of Philadelphia and- Baltimore, approxi-malely approxi-malely 90 per cent or more of the milk received Is transported by motortruck. motor-truck. Baltimore gets 45 per cent of its milk by truck and the proportion I here is steadily increasing. Philadelphia's Philadel-phia's percentage, 20 per cent, Is low, because the city's large demands necessitate neces-sitate drawing milk from an area outside out-side the economical motortruck ratlins. ra-tlins. Nevertheless, Philadelphia has been getting more and more milk by truck in recent years. Rates for transporting milk by motortruck mo-tortruck usually conform closely to the rates charged by railroads. No case was found where the truck rate was less than the railroad rate. In some cases it exceeded the rail rates. In comparing motortruck rates with railroad rail-road rates, however, the department points out that the motortruck rates include pick-up service 1n many cases, and in all cases includes delivery service serv-ice at the city milk plant. Rail shipments ship-ments of milk have to be hauled by farmers to country railway stations, and by dairy or city milk dealers from railroad terminals to milk distributing plants. Terminal Handling Costs. It Is estimated by the dealers In lialtlmore that terminal handling costs from half a cent to one cent a gallon, a charge which is eliminated when milk Is brought direct to the plant by truck. A questionnaire to milk producers pro-ducers indicated the saving they are able to make in costs by the use of the motortruck. Forty-oight shippers figured fig-ured that shipping by truck saved them an aggregate daily road haul of 117.25 miles. The producers who are most likely to ship by truck are those who are most distant from their railroad stations. Many other farm products are efficiently effi-ciently handled by motortruck, notably nota-bly perishable fruit and vegetables. Shipments of such goods by motortruck motor-truck has prodded a continuous supply of perishable foods at many smaller towns where such supplies could not formerly be maintained because rail service was infrequent and irregular. It has lessened the operatiug costs of mercantile establishments by enabling them to replenish their stocks at more frequent intervals. |
