The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1889-10-10
MODEL FOR IMITATION.
Boston's Street Railways-Great Sue
cess of Electric Cars.
From the Baltimore Sun.


cess of Electric Cars.
From the Baltimore Sun.
Boston, MASS, Oct. 5.-What strikes
the visitor to Boston most forcibly is the
great street railway system. The transit
facilities would impress anybody, no mat
ter how much metropolitanism he might
claim for his native town, but the
Baltimorean is simply astounded, struck
of heap and overwhelmed when
he sees the greatest city and sub
urban railway plan of the entire world
Hot with wish to see the Monumental
City profit by such facilities as Boston
possesses, the wanderer at once makes a re-
solve to button-hole every Baltimore CITY
railway president and pour Into his ear
tale sparkling with enthusiasm about cleo
tricity, fast time, short intervals, motors,
dynamos, and things of that sort. But on
the way home the picture of each particu-
lar railway man rises before him, and he
realizes what an utterly hopeless case he
has to deal with, and he cools off like bit
of molten tallow dropping into a tub of ice
water M
Just think, for a moment, of a system of
street railways under one management con-
sisting of $50 miles of tracks, a length of
rail which, if laid continuously, would
stretch from Baltimore nearly to New
Haven, Conn and think of a town. with
its suburbs, having 33S miles of street rail
way facilities. One can here ride 100 miles
without getting upon the same line twice:
or he may start out early in the morning and
ride in the same way until nightfall with
out repeating a trip on any branch Of the
road, and without walking over half mile
to make certain connections. He can ride
continuously northward from Boston, pass
ing over fifteen miles of road, through the
towns of Everett, Maiden, Melrose and
Stoneham, or he can start in the heart of
the city and ride twenty miles to Hamilton,
in Essex county, by horse cars.
AN ENORMOUS SUBURB.
Boston's glory is in her suburbs. went
to the top of the weather office tower with
a Bostonian, where, with the air of Crusoe,
he swept his hand around the horizon and
said: These are the Hubs adjuncts. These
are the spokes of the wheel. There is Mel
rose, my home, seven and a-half miles dis
tant from my office. kiss my wife good
by on the doorstep each morning, and
within thirty minutes / am hard at work
on the fourth floor of business house on
Washington street. in the center of the
city. No, we Boston people do not believe
we have monopoly of all the culture and
baked beans in the world, but we
are proud OF our suburban travel
LttCLt1btOcs WO nO DiOuu VI
radiating fully fifteen miles from
the center Of Boston, containing in them
selves such large towns as Lynn, which you
will see ten miles away in this direction,
and of the dozens of towns and settlements
to the right, to the left, before and behind us.
"Were the street railways and the electric
roads started because of a lack of steam
facilities? O, no! On the contrary, we
have the largest kind of service by the
n<a L,z..s = l.
tween stations within a half mile of each
other. These two stations have no less than
ffty-five trains each way daily, including
late night trains, which take shoppers and
theater parties home. In all there are be-
tween 400 and 800 steam trains day be-
tween Boston and the other towns.
while Boston has not so great popula-
ton in the city proper as Baltimore, her
environs contain over 1,00o,000 people, or
more than twice the number Ct Boston's
population. The city has grown by reason
of transit facilities and that growth has
only resulted in repaying the transportation
companies a thousandfold.
ELECTRICITY IS KING.
"The GROWING triumph of Boston's
means of transit is the electric railroad,
which, as you see, bowls along over streets
and avenues, climbs hills and descends
grades, carrying thousands of passengers
daily, and turning enormous revenue into
the Golfers of the railroad company. The
motor cars are of about thirty-horse power
each, and nearly every motor car has an
ordinary street car attached, both being
generally filed with people.
''The Allston and Chestnut Hill line is
eight miles long. There is a branch Of
this road three miles long. running from
Coollidge's Corner TO the Chestnut Hill
reservoir, and passengers starting on the
first line, in the heart of the city, may ride
the entire nine miles for cents. The Cam
bridge line runs from Bowdoin square, in
the business section, TO Harvard square,
and thence through Cambridge TO Airing
ton, distance Of seven miles. Thus, there
are already tairty- even miles Of single
track and appurtenances in existence, and
an army Of men are at work extending
lines and laying new tracks"
FIYE-cENT FARES.
A person may 20 the whole length Of any
Of these lines for i've cents, except upon tbs
last two miles Of to Arlington rad. whore
the scarcity Of the travel causes fever