History
The public transport concept known today represents something very different than it was in the early of the first decade of the twentieth century. The social situation lived at that time reflected a society devoted almost exclusively to an agricultural activity of subsistence with poor economic resources and social needs. Everything was done with the human strength and courage until the construction of the first regional roads that have occurred between the year 1913 and 1918. This important development has encouraged the emergence of transport routes and consequently the buses in Caniço. The first bus to have established a non-regular route took place around the year 1920, connecting Caniço to Câmara de Lobos passing by Funchal city. It was a twice-a-day trip, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. This bus, with the license plate M-83, was owned by Mr. César Pedro Duarte, resident at Sítio da Pedra Mole.
At that time, every bus owner could request to the Administrative Council of Funchal District the concession to have a transport route between Funchal and Caniço. In 1930, there were already 28 drivers working for someone else and 16 working on their own in the Municipality of Santa Cruz. The growth of the number of buses, associated with their licenses, became a lively competition, often unfair, between the owners of those vehicles.
In order to avoid this kind of unfair competition, a group of bus owners decided to create the Automobile Company of Caniço and implemented a regular service with fixed schedules. Thus, on the 29th January 1934, eight bus owners went to the solicitor's office at that time, the bachelor João Batista Amaral Barata, located at "Praça do Município", and made a constitution deed of a commercial shareholding society by limited responsibility. The signatories were João Freitas Patrício and José Indaleto Izidro de Freitas, resident at Sítio da Vargem, Alexandre Vieira and José Vieira, resident at Sítio do Livramento, José Teixeira Júnior and António Freitas Forte, resident at Sítio da Abegoaria, José Filipe Rodrigues, resident at Cancela (Parish of São Gonçalo), and finally Henrique Franco Júnior, resident at Sítio da Azenha.
This new company aimed the transport of passengers and goods and its capital was 35.000$00, divided into eight shares (six of 5.000$00 and two of 2.500$00). These two shares belonged to the members Alexandre Vieira and José Vieira. The Society was represented by an Administrative team consisting of three members who were assigned to be the main managers: José Indaleto Izidro de Freitas, João Freitas Patrício and Henrique Franco Júnior. There was also an assistant manager - Pedro Filipe do Rego, responsible for minor services such as updating schedules, distributing vehicles and representing the company in the competent departments.
The eight buses owned by the shareholders were considered patrimony of the society. Profits or eventual losses would be divided among the members in proportion to their shares.
Right after the foundation of the company, its members made a request to the Administrative Council of Funchal district asking permission to have a schedule in common. On 28th February 1934 the regular route service for passengers started between Funchal and Caniço. The company Head Office was located at Sítio da Vargem, Caniço, and the bus rank was located at Largo do Pelourinho, near the "Companhia Insular de Moinhos". Later, it was transferred to the old mill Henrique Figueira, in the same square. The garage was located at Sítio da Assomada near the old primary school. It was also transferred in the fifties to the actual premises at Sítio da Pedra Mole.
The Buses
All vehicles had the roof made on wood or canvas lined where packages or baskets were placed when they could not be transported inside. In the luggage hold there was a recipient made of a material similar to tin where water was transported to refuel the bus during the trip in case of overheating. Later, with the evolution of public fountains network, the water recipient has been replaced by a piece of air chamber, which was filled up at the public fountains whenever it was necessary.
The first timetable of the Caniço's Automobile Company did not include services for every day of the week as we have now. In fact, trips were held only from Monday to Friday, not including Saturdays and Sundays. This schedule was only changed in 1936 due to the update of the timetable which was in force until mid 1939.
The following price list was published enclosed to the Company timetable. (Currency: escudos)
Nowadays, the fares of that time seem insignificant to us, however, they were not accessible to all pockets. In fact, the majority of Caniço inhabitants used to go to Funchal on foot, taking about an hour and half to get there and two hours on their way back. A good reference of poor-paid jobs is the ticket clerk whose salary "did not exceed $ 2 50 per day." These values were substantially altered in 1948, when the he started to earn 10 $ 00 daily. The rise in the wages corresponded also to a rise in the fares as we can see in the following table:
As mentioned before, the Automobile Company of Caniço had its own rank at the "Largo do Pelourinho". This location was the starting point for the people who wanted to go to Caniço. We would see there the rank manager, the person responsible for organizing all the vehicles in the bus rank. He was also responsible for guiding and informing the clients about the departure schedule.
According to a city council decree held on 28th October 1932, both the driver and the ticket clerk were obliged to wear a dark blue cap with a varnished eye-shade, and present themselves at the service properly dressed and with their beard shaved. This decree intended to keep the good name of the civilized tourist status that Madeira Island had acquired throughout the years. The rule also forbade drivers to wear short shirtsleeves or unbuttoned shirts. Those who did not respect this rule would pay a fine of 25 $ 00, or $ 50 in case of recurrence, exorbitant prices for the living standards of that time. However, this rule only acquired binding force in 1934 after its publication by the Administrative Council of Funchal district.
Before the beginning of each trip there were some procedures to be done by the ticket clerk. He would have to crank the vehicle's engine in order to make it work. He would also display the information plates with the final destination of the bus. There were three plates for this purpose that were placed manually: two plates written "CANIÇO" or "FUNCHAL" and another with the word "COMPLETE". The ticket clerk who failed to accomplish these procedures would pay a fine. In addition to these tasks, he was also responsible for putting away baskets or packages on the roof of the bus with the help of a small ladder that buses used to have at the back. For each basket or package the passenger would pay $ 1 00. Of all the trips, those which implied more work were the ones that started at 6.00 a.m., as most of the passengers were milkmen carrying the milk pots in the aisle, and the ones that started at 11.00 a.m., due to the volume of baskets with lunch. This kind of luggage had often to be piled on the roof, sometimes causing accidents due to bad packaging. Besides the fact that most of the baskets or packages were carried on the roof of the bus, many of them were transported inside the vehicle reducing even more its limited space. This practice led to a recurring intervention of Road Services in order to forbid drivers to accept this type of packaging especially if it was meant to be transported at the entry of vehicles.
All tickets were sold on board by the ticket clerk. When buying a ticket, the passenger should keep it until the end of the trip. He would then give it back to the driver who would check it and destroy it later. Besides this control, there was another one held at the end of the day which was done by the assistant manager. He would confirm all the tickets that were sold and check the correspondence with the last number of the pack of tickets.
From 1948, the company started to have a ticket office. The numbering of the seats was also introduced in order to enable the sale of tickets in advance. In fact, from this year on, any passenger could book a seat by purchasing a ticket for a particular time. All these booked seats were marked by a plate with the word "BOOKED" and could only be taken if the passengers who had booked them did not enter at the bus stop they were supposed to. Sometimes, the bus left Funchal with half of the seats booked to "Chão da Loba", "A Americana" or "A Brasileira" by clients who had bought tickets in advance.
In addition to the regular routes, the company did also rental services such as excursions or travel tours to some traditional festivities like "Nossa Senhora do Livramento" which was one of the most popular events of Madeira Island at that time. This particular festivity required a permanent bus service. All permits to make any trips to Caniço had to be required to the Road Services. Of the seven buses that the company had, only five were authorized to offer the rental service which was not enough towards the high demanding for that event. Although each trip cost 4 $ 00 many pilgrims waited long hours at the Pelourinho for the arrival of buses. As the service provided by the Automobile Company of Caniço was insufficient, other public transport companies could compete making trips to Caniço. Sometimes, the traditional festivity of "Livramento" implied about 30 to 35 buses per day. All buses of Caniço had priority over those from other companies. Therefore, these companies could only make trips after the buses of Canico had left the rank.
