REVIVAL OF TRAMS

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 102, 27 October 1925, Page 14

REVIVAL OF TRAMS

AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

HOLDING THEIR OWN TO-DAY.

At a time when everybody seems to bo engaged iv "knocking," as they say, the tramcar and prophesying its early doom in the .struggle for existence with the, motor-bus, it is only fair to quote any evidence to the contrary. America has often been cited as the place whero the motor-car and tho motor-bus between them have killed what there they call tho street-car. It usc*d to bo.said that practically all the street-car companies, for the trams arc run by private enterprise in American cities, were in the hands of. receivers, or at any rate on the verge of bankruptcy. There was a good deal of truth in the statement in tho years immediately following tho war, for wages went up on an average nearly 70 per cent., and fares had to remain the same.

In May, 1919, the U.S. Secretary of Commerce and the U.S. Secretary of Labour addressed a joint report to President Wilson, containing tiic following passage :—"A.lready fifty or more urban systems are in the Lands of receivers. The communities affected are among the most important—New York, Providence, Buffalo, New Orleans, Denver, St. Louis, Birmingham, Pittsburgh; Memphis, Fort Wayne, Dcs Moines, St. Paul, and Spokane. Other largo systems arc on the verge oE insolvency, for tho industry as a whole is virtually bankrupt." Five years later tho position was entirely altered, and instead of companies going into receivership most of them were on tho way to complete recovery, or had actually recovered, with their status restored iv the financial world. In spile of motor-car and motor-bus competition, it appears from official figures that street-cars are being used more'than ever.

The revival of the street-car in America has been helped by legislative authority to increase fares, and the 5 cent universal fare of pre-war days has been raised to an average now over tho United States ol 7.4 cents. In many States there is also legislative protection against irresponsible motor-bus competition. Irresponsible motor-bus operators are no longer permitted to establish bus services on routes adequately served by electric lines. Many companies have also been, relieved of the. burden of maintaining pavement which ' they neither use nor destroy. In reference to motor-buses superseding trams, a prominent authority points out that it takes about two and a half buses to carry the same number of passengers as a tram under peak load conditions, and that in tha largo cities it would bo impossible on account of street congestion for motorbuses to take the place of tramcars. The general conchiion is that tho electric tram will remain part of the passenger transport system of cities for many years to corned