The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-04-06
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 1866.
The Chesnut street Brldge.

lne CneSnuL SJfeet oIIuBSs
WE were told the other day, seriously, too,
that the Chestnut Street Bridge will be finished
and opened for travel on or about the 1st OF
June next. There are great many people
who would be glad to believe this; but hav-
ing had their hopes so frequently disappointed,
they are unwilling to again put faith in any
predictions or promises respecting the com
pletion of the work that has moved so slowly
towards its contamination. % 10
Moreover, there is no visible evidence that
the bridge is making much progress. 1t re-
quires week at least to detect any change
in its appearance. At intervals of that length
a close observer may possibly discover that
bit OF timber or iron has been added here and
there, but any one who daily passes the
melancholy ediflce as it creeps languidly for
ward, is hardly made sensible, by the testi
mony of his eyes, that it has grown at all in
its proportions. The identical four or five
solitary men who have been for a year or
more wandering around, and about and upon
the bridge in a mysterious manner, may still,
be seen there, going through the same mar
vellous motions of dreary disquiet and de-
sibilities, can gaze upon the spectacle without
sincere sentiment Of commiseration, min
gled with sense of perplexing curiosity.
1t may be asked why those poor fellows are
kept so long at their lonely toll? Why is
not the force on the work increased2 Fifty
men, laboring steadily and earnestly, would
finish the whole job in twenty days from this
IoNo Ahorv - nI,o
reason probably is that the iron work for the
superstructure of the bridge is not ready to
be put up, and cannot be supplied by the
contractor faster than four or five men can
place the pieces in position. If this be so,
then there can be no good or sufficient ex-
euse for the fact, and the City Councils
should take some vigorous measures to ex-
pedite this part OF the work.
But let us suppose that the bridge will be
opened for public use in June or July
proximo. Will the >Chesnut and Walnut
Streets City Passenger Railroad Company be
entirely prepared at that time to run their
cars across the bridge and out to the western
end Of their proposed route? Probably not.
At least that Company are apparently taking
Neither Chestnut nor Walnut street is yet
paved beyond the bridge west of the
Schuylkill nor are there any signs of
any movement to pave those streets, much
less to lay the railway tracks along
them. AS this work will take some
time, should it not be begun at once, so that
the cars may be un out to Forty-second
street as soon as the bridge is completed?
The present large amount of travel between
the east and west extremities of the city re-
quires much more accommodation than it
now enjoys. The Market Street City Passen-
ger Railway is not nearly adequate to the
service that is required of it, and as long az
it is allowed to exist as monopoly the
public must expect to have its absolute
or even reasonable wants treated with
insolent contempt by that avaricious and
domineerng corporation which now con-
trolls the only means OF railway transi
from Front to Forty-frst street. 1t is, of
course, interested to delay both the compile.
tion of the Chestnut Street Bridge and the ex-
tension of the line of the Chestnut and Walnut
Streets Passenger Railroad beyond the east
side of the Schuylkill But it is to be hoped
that both of those results will speedily be
realized; and unless we are mistaken, there is
competent legal power to finally defeat the
selfish plans and influence of one of the most
offensive railway monopolies that has ever
yet afflicted the people OF Philadelphia.