Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-07-06
LIGHT FOR THE CITY.
A Gigantic Electric Illuminating and
Motive Power Project,
COMPETITOR FOR WESTINGHOUSE.
Another Duquesne Company Applies to
Councils for Rights.
WIRES TO BE PLACED UNDERGROUND


The Councils Committee on Corporations
yesterday voted to recommend for passage an
ordinance granting TO the Duquesne Electric
Light and Power Company the right to erect
poles, string wires and lay underground con-
duits and cables in any or all of the streets
of Pittsburg. The committee also voted
af6rmatively on an ordinance granting to the
Diamond Light Company the right to lay
underground conduits and electric cables in
the streets of the First ward.
These companies represent big project.
They are in some way connected, or, at any
rate, they will cooperate in their work. The
Duquesne Electric Light and Power Com
pany indicates an organization as extensive
in its aims as the Duquesne Traction Com
pany.
For some weeks before its introduction the
Du9uesne ordinance had been spoken of in
certain circles, as probability. There have
been two rumors about it. One had it that
the Jenney electric light people were getting
up the company with local habitation on
the Monongahela river bank, where water
could be had easily, without paying high
city water tax, and where coal could be de-
livered cheaply in barges for fuel. The
other report, and the one most credited,
looked to a still more extensive enterprise.
1t points to the people who are in the Du-
quesne Traction Company as the incorpor-
ators.
LONG LOOKING THIS WAY.
AS is known, the Duquesne Traction lines
are to be run with the Thompson Houston
electric system. The Thompso Houston
people have long been willing to attempt a
Iodgment in Pittsburg under favorable aus
pices. The theory now is that the big power
stations which are to supply electricity to
operate the roads are also to supply it for
lighting and general power purposes.
The same plant can serve both
purposes, and the excess of electricity
be taken up in commercial light
ing. The Duquesne Traction people have
already the right to put up poles-at
least along their railway. The ordinance
now proposed will give them rights else
where through the city. 1t can readily be
conceived that if this is the scope of the
new company, business is meant on a very
extensive scale, and that the prospects for a
lively competition with the Allegheny
County Electric Light Company are decid-
edly interesting.
The Allegheny County Company started
about 10 years ago, with tine Brush system,
Westinghouse. 1t supplies about 30, 900
incandescent lights, besides a great many
arc lights. The value per light from the
incandescent plant is about $40 to S12 per
annum. At present the charges are mostly
by meter. That some interest has been felt
by the Allegheny County Company in the
possibility of the Thompson Houston people
coming in as competitors under the wing of
the Du1uesne Traction people has been a
matter of quiet discussion for weeks back.
There has been practically no competitor
thus far, as the only other organized COM
pany supplying lights is the Electric Power
and Light Company, whose plant on
Diamond street above Smithfeld, is OF the
Edison and Thompson-H Houston direct COM
bined system, and which contents itself 30
far with giving a good service in q limited
area. 1t furnishes less than 1000 lights at
present.
AN EXTENSIVE SYSTEM.
One of the persons interviewed as to the new
ordinances last night said that the Duquesne
ordinance undoubtedly had in eontempla-
tion an extensive system; that the Traction
people intended to make il comprehensive,
and that lively competition, resulting in
low prices or, perhaps, an ultimate consoli-
dation OF interests with existing companies,
might be looked for. He thought that
whatever franchises were needed from the
city could be had. At the same time, he
said: Electric lighting has to be con-
Quoted economically, for where it has to
compete with low-prieed gas there is no big
bonanza in it. 1t cannot be depended to
pay big on watered capitalization
where there is much competition. The
nection with the Allegheny County
Electric Lighting Company, but
the Westinghouse Electric Light Com
panv has great interest in
maintaining for the Allegheny County Com
pany, which uses its system, success at home |
as against rival systems. Besides the same |
people are interested in the stock The |
Duquesne Company may have advantages |
in being able to combine the operation of the |
street railways with the lighting plant, and |
in the use of the same machinery, but on the |
other hand in case of competition the Phla-
delphia Gas Company could, in turn, make |
any new electric lighting project weary by |
the low prices at which it could, if it chose, |
make and furnish Illuminating gas. 1t is a |
fact that ior years back much of the gas |
furnished by the illuminating gas compa-
nies is obtained by them from the natural |
gas companies at prices as low as 8 to 10 |
cents per thousand feet. This, after a mix |
ing process, is retailed to consumers at 81 |
and 81 20 per thousand. At the latter rate |
it costs about the same as electric lighting. |
At about the same cost electric lights are |
preferred, but if the Philadelphia Gas Com
pany ever took a notion to supply illumina-
ting gas as cheap as it might, the Duquesne |
or any other company antagonizing the
Allegheny County concern, would wait
long while for profits"
As to the Diamond Company, for which,an
ordinance was recommended yesterday all |
the reporter could last night learn, was that
its scope was intended to be local, and that
it was meant Tor the present only to supply |
lights in the First ward, and particularly |
in the neighborhood of the Diamond market.
The principle promoter of the Diamond
Light Company is George S. Fleming, the
head of the firm OF Joseph Fleming & Son,
wholesale druggists and liquor sellers.
WHAT HE KNOWS ABOUT IT.
1t is said that both c. L. Magee and Will
lam Finn will be large owners of stock in
the new Duquesne Electric Company. c.
L. Magee was not at home last evening
when reporter called at his house. His
brother, w. A. Magee. who is member of
Council for the Fourteenth ward, was found
at his home and toldswhat he knew about
the new concern. This, he said, was very
little He said that the Diamond Com pany
would put its wires entirely underground in
the streets. The Duquesue Company, in
the ordinance approved yesterday, agrees
to put all current wires run on Fl tn ave-
nue. and Penn avenue, and all below Grant
street, underground.
Here is an important feature in connec-
tion with these new companies. They
promise to pave the way for general ordi-
nance compelling the placing of all
wires under the streets. If these companies
as their promoters have no
doubt that they will, that the conduit sys-
tenn can be successfully operated, public
sentiment will demand, without prospect of
effective opposition, that all electric wires