Litchfield enquirer., 1878-08-22
Rapid Transit in New York.

was generally regarded as frantic and futile chimera. To-day there are two elevated rail- roads, When the first iron pillars were raised along Greenwich Street and up Ninth Avenue, it was declared that it was an intolerable nuisance and disagreement of the street. To- day main streets are occupied with the trestle- work of the railway, and the aerial traveller shoots by steam through the thoroughfares from Central Park to the Battery and from the Battery to Harlem. No spot in the world, within the same time can show a more mirac- ulous change than that of the New Amsterdam of Governor Stuyvesant to the New York of Mayor Ely and as the passenger whlrls across the island in the time that old Governor Peter used to stump from end to end of the Battery, he may curiously wonder what municipal marvels the next two centuries will produce
 Should this printed leaf flutter down to the reader of that day, he will be glad to know something of the beginning of the elevated street railways. If he will imagine, then, going down little street by the south side of Trinity Churchyard, which now surrounds Trinity Church, he will find in the next street parallel with Broadway a structure which covers it like a massive low bridge. He looks up the long perspective of rafters underneath, and that is all that he sees of the street. As cending wooden staircase to the top of the bridge, he finds an office, where he pays ten cents for ticket, and passes immediately into car remarkable for it's light elegance. The form of the seats and of the woodwork is graceful the seats-for it is Summer-are of cane, and there is a general freshness and coOlness of aspect which is very agreeable. In a moment the train is moving with curi- ous solidity of action, the wheels running in grooves that would seem to make the mishap most to be feared-that of leaving the track quite impossible There are a dozen passen- iy,t md in noah of the three cars of the train, and there is train from the station we have just left every three minutes.
 We roll along at the level of the second story windows of the larger houses, stopping at frequent stations, which are gay and pretty wooden buildings, with gates and warnings to prevent needless stepping in front of the con- stant trains Suddenly our speed is slackened almost to stopping, and we turn at right angles down street, and presently at the same angle, resume our nOrtherly course. Th's involves great loss of headway, and consequently of speed, which will be remedied some day. As we roll on, our view is confined to the faces of the houses that line the street and the glimpScs and vistas of the cross streets. But as we reach the broad Sixth Avenue we sec more of the life of the shops and sidcwalks we are opening out into the broader parts of the city there are stately churches and lofty houses: and suddenly there is the green country before us-we are at the Central Park, and it is twen- ty or twenty-five minutes since we left Trinity Church.
 To the passenger there has been but one diScomf6rt-the smoke and the fine dust from the locomotive. It has been surprisingly de- lightful journey. Omnibuses and street cars are the monsters of a distempered fancy. GO- ing down town or going home is a charming excursion. But while this is his own person al experience the passenger, as he has caught sight in his flight of a chamber in an upper story, with the bed towards the window, the bureau, the table, and tine chair-a seclusion ruthlessly invaded every moment by hundreds of careless seyes, by continuous roar, and puff of dust and smOke-has wondered what the lodger may think of it all, and what the lodger, with ruined privacy and murdered sleep. may have to say to the landlord, hot and profane from the mere apprehension of complaint and warning These rooms arc darkened sometimes; there are sickness, suff- ering. death in them; but the rattle and jar and smoke and dust go stOrming by necessarily. The passenger sees also the shops below, and his imagination goes into them, accompanying the shopper" whipping dust from her sacquc and cinders from her eyes, and 'cheapening the goods amid the rumble of the train, and he wonders if the noise and the smoke and OIIS uuoe pIOhOtC iiOSpSiIg Ol Shopo. The carriage horses passing under the frame work of the railway do not seem to be flight ened. They lift their heads, perhaps, as the train comes laundering over, but that is all. Indeed, everybody is compelled to observe that here is a new thing, another step for ward, another improvement of the nineteenth century which has come, and, despite cham bers and dodgers and landlords and shop-keep- CTS, has ''come to stay"
 There have been protests of property holders and physicians, and suits have been brought and meetings held. The railway has been de- nOunced as the result of mOnstrous usurpa. tion of public force over private right, fore casting the Commune itself But the convic- tion of public convenience will probably pre- vail over all, and the problem of rapid transit will have been solved by the aerial method. It must produce great changesof value. Streets through which such roads run will cease to be streets of dwelling houses or of small shops. These will withdraw into the neighborhOOd adjacent, near enough for use, and out of the reach of the noise. The current of in- creasing population will be turned from New Jersey and Long Island to the regIon between the North River and the Sound, which will thus have a swift and direct connection with the lower city, ,unveXed by Ice or fog or storm. But the sagacity of the city must now secure as certainly swift and cheap freight connec- tion with the West, or it may find the increas- ed facility of local transit will not alone retain the supremacy of New York.-Hdrper's Mug zine.