Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1888-04-21
BROOKLYN BRIDGE.Y
TWO HUNDRED TICKETS PER MIN.
UTE DURING "Rush HOURS"

A Steady Stream Of shop Girls, werkins-
women and Men. R1ornisg and Evsniag.
Patrons of the Footpsth-stsrtiing sta-
tistics-Cost and Profits.
The day on the bridge begins early. At
O O'Clock In the morning the cars begin to
run under minute and half headway.
The crowds pour in and what Is known as
the crush hours" begin. These are hours
Of hard work for every one, from the
superintendent Of the road down to the
humblest brakeman. The little dummy
engines that run the three car trains from
the station out to the point where tho
cable connects with the grip rush back
ward and forward, putting and snorting
and making q tremendous amount Of
noise.
This Is at 7:30 on the Brooklyn side.
About 10, 900 New York business men and
workmen, who use Brooklyn as a bed.
room, are getting ready to launch them.
selves into New York. At 7:45 the stream
is at high tide. At two glass covered
boxes within the spot where three men
are laboring with frantic energy TO give
out tickets and make change, two stall
wart men stand to see that every passen-
ger deposits ticket These men need to
be alert and quick eyed, for 200 persons
per minute are passing by these two glass
ticket boxes. 1t may seem easy work to
watch 12 900 tickets per hour dropped In
TO glnss box, but the guards say 1t has
the effect Of giving one the vertigo.
From 2 o'clock until $50 the stream of
humbly clad shop girls and working
women and men is kept steadily up, and
some twenty odd thousand passengers are
carried over the river. Three cars start
each minute and half, but in the Sec
onds that they are at standstill each of
the cars is amply packed with ten tons of
humanity. This rush is kept up until
$50 O'Clock, after which there is lull,
the number of passengers passing the
ticket offices falling gradually from Il, 900
to G,OOO per hour. Approaching noon it
is even less on the Brooklyn side, but
after this hour on the New York side the
thousands that thronged to New York
are hurrying back again, and after
o'clock Brooklyn begins to regain its
population at the rate of from 200 to 300
per minute.
PATRONS OF THE F6oTwAY.
or course these figures dea4 simply with
the railway The footpath is less patron
lied now than formerly. There were
354, ,304 less persons who used it last year
than the year before, despite the fact that
any one who wishes to buy tickets by tho
bunch may walk over the bridge and get
the finest views imaginable for the not
astounding sum Of one-fifth of q cent.
The footway is popular only on very mild
days, when 1t Is the resort favored of good
looking nurses with distracting French
caps, who wheel baby carriages and ad-
mire the big policemen. The receipts of
the footway last year amounted to some
hfyxrv x.,h; ;,I -.
pay its expenses, and 1t has been proposed
to make it free. This will scarcely be
done, for making It free would be throw
ing it open to tramps or worse charac-
ters, and making an increase Of police
necessary.
The bridge railroad last year carried
q, 940, ,8l3 persons, an increase of 3,911,-
040 over the year before, and the receipts
in money from it were $7GS, 7GS.79. The
fare is three cents per passage or ten
tickets for twenty-five cents. The general
average Of passengers upon the bridge
| road is about 1000 per day, but upon
foggy days, when the ferries are OBJ.
| structed, the figures sometimes reach 1876,
900. In other words enough people pass
over the Brooklyn bridge every day in the
| cars to populate three or four towns out
west, elect a few congressman, build
several railroads, get up corners in wheat
and pork and bring out presidential can
didate.
SOME MORE STATISTICS.
But there are some more statistics with
which not one person in a hundred ever
Of those who cross the bridge daily are nc
luainted and familiar. One million forty
seven thousand nine hundred and sixty
eight vehicles crossed the bridge during
last year. Each vehicle is estimated tC
carry three passengers. This estimate i:
taken by reason of the number of funeral.
that daily pass on their way TO Green
wood, the great "City Of the Dead" TIL,
receipts from vehicles were $65, 743. 90
The total receipts were $3.50 724. 23.
may be interesting to know, too, that tn.
cars during the last year made AIN AS
single trips and travelled {, 2,442, ,470 miles
In other words, had the tracks Of tn,
bridge continued right around the worlt
the bridge cars would have grded tn,
world pretty nearly 100 times.
The bridge cost $15,000.000. It Il
worth it, but it has not yet paid it back
Its sources Of revenue are various. Tn,
stone arches underits approaches have beel
walled up and are rented as ware houses
It charges the telephone and telegraph
companies for laying wires on the bridge
sources for the year was $93s, ,2S1. 81, an,
the net profits were s323, s64 SO. 1t ha
been necessary TO lay out most of thi
sum, however, in rolling stock and in pay
ments for real estate. Exactly 2,070, go
| lives OF humanity were conveyed acros
the East river in 1887 without a singl
life being lost. That is true enough
be startling, and startling enough to b
untrue. However, it Is true! When 20