Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-07-03
A TOUR OF THE TOWN.
Thirty-Five Miles in City Street Cars
in Less Than Six Hours.
RAPID TRANSIT PUT TO THE TEST.
Scenes in the Cars and Caught From Their
Windows by the Way.
AN EXCURSION WITHIN CITY LIMITS


better than to put in a day on the street
cars. This is not the penance it would have
been in the days, not so very long past, when
taking passage upon a street car from down
town to East Liberty, for example, was as
serious matter as engaging a cabin fo1
Europe. The patient mule no longer plods
his weary way, the decrepit car-horse has
Joined the Farmers Alliance, and the bob
tailed car has gone South or West to grow
gradually out of existence. In the place OF
the meek meanderings of the mule and
horse, with the dirty, dingy and generally
disreputable cars attached to them, large cars
of the latest pattern, lofty, well-ventilated,
comfortable and good to look at, have been
introduced, and the change in the cars them
selves is almost as remarkable as that of
motive power. OF course everybody knows
this, but it is extremely questionable If ten
per cent of those who ride at all on the street
cars have as yet sampled SO to speak, the
delights of rapid transit in all the shapes in
which it is now vouchsafed to Pittsburg.
Two citizens of Pittsburg made the attempt
yesterday to ride over all the new traction
lines of the city, and by continuous voyag-
ing in all sorts of vehicles for about six hours
they covered the greater part of the field
and were content to leave the small balance
to another day.
Some Things Seen on the Southside.
1t is not a bad scheme to take in the South
side 11rst-for if you like the busy borough
OIL the other side of the Monongahela the
visit will be a pleasant starter and if you
don't like it why then there is the satisfae-
tion of being done with it. The Birming-
ham cars are among the handsomest of the
new order. and believe are absolutely the
largest. They were made by the Gilbert
Car Manufacturing Company at Troy, N. Y,
and have the double four-wheeled trucks,
which make them as steady and easy-going
as Pullman palace cars. The scheme Of col
the dull m TIA tan S and ' biae of sUsu the ceiling %
to the eye. One would think that
the hour the explorers boarded a
time of light travel, but the car was
crowded and remained so till Sixteenth
street was passed. Returning the cap filled
up rapidly and half dozen men were stand,
ing in the aisle when it reached Smithfeld
street. In spite of many stops, and an OBJ
stinate truckman with load of wire who
had the modest notion that Carson street
was created for his sole use and declined to
be disabused thereof until several yards of
profanity had been whirled about him, the
round trip from Fourth avenue to the ter
minutes The Southside ought to feel
means Of COMMUNICATION ''W with Pitts.
burg's center. By the way, the new
d
passage to the southside, from which-and
of course, from Duquesne Heights
the best view OF the Court House and the
lower part of the city is obtainable. How
great changes rapid transit is making was
suggested by the remark of one woman to
another in the Birmingham car that she was
going to market in Anegheny-she could
street, to the Allegheny Market House in
less than half an hour via the Birmingham
and the Pleasant Valley lines
Out in the East by the Duqnesne.
The contraction of the lower end Of Pitts
burg is a convenience, when you are making
1 street car tour. All the lines either GROSS
each other or come within q block of doing
20. So you can step from a Southside car
into one of the very similar electric cars of
the Duquesne line, at the Fourth avenue
and smithfield street crossing. The Pull
man cars of the Duquesne line resemble the \
lines, but they are perhaps q
little more comfortable, and brighter in ap-
pearance. The route Of the Duquesne, con-
sidered asthetfcally, is very attractive: there
s plenty OF variety, 1t swings by the new
postoff1ce, in front of which Mr.. Patterson
Is putting in some final licks on a substan-
tial pavement; by the Court House. our prize |
ion, and its satellite, the prize jail, and |
nurries so precipitately from the odoriferous |
Did avenue to Forbes that 1t itapparently goes
through the middle of house-at least you |
see a section of a house sliced off by the curb |
that looks for all the world like one of those |
,haste imaginings in profile with which |
architects illuminate their plans and befog |
Of cultivated landscape than the long, level |
awns of Oakland, the ornamental garden |
ng the warm-tinted gabled houses, and the |
succeeding charms of wilder woodland and |
that Schenley Park presents. A |
swarm of men were digging away at a new1
entrance to the park, under the keen eve Of |
senator Finn himself, as our car flew past,
md the work seems to be well advanced,
Coming up Soho Hill, the inevitable man
with a four horse team got in our path and |
declined to get out of it till he reached the |
rest of the hill.
Sandy and the Painted Cart.
"That reminds me-" said the other fellow |
% THE DISPATCH reporter, "of a Scotch |
nan who came to work for firm |
N Pittsburg q dozen years ago. Sandy |
was from the Isle of Skye OF some |
,ther spot a triie out of the track of |
lorse with any man, he could not in his first |
efforts master the perplexities of city traffic. |
The consequence was he was away behind |
lime with his work, and his employer asked |
lin how he came to be so slow. Sandy ex-
)lained that he could make no progress
when he had to turn out of the road every
minute, and was kept tacking back and
orth all the while. His employer told Sandy |
lot to give way to any man-that he had as
rood right to the road as anybody
10 Sandy went off the next day whistling,
)uL ABOUT noon WOrO came TO the store
hat Sandy had been arrested and was in
Central station. His employer hurried down
10 the police station, and found that Sandy
lad been locked up for blocking a street car
rack. Sandy was released, but he persisted
hat he had obeyed his masters Instructions
% yield the road to no man, and when the
street car was pointed out as an exception,
sandy rejoined: L dinna ken the differ
wiyt ane painted cart an anithern"
There are good many drivers in Pitts
burg who if they can tell one painted cart
rom another, discriminate against the street
ar all the time.
1t is safe to say that few people look down
soho Hill from Duquesne car without
thinking of what would happen if the car
,roke away and started back to town. fester-
lay an old railroader who was ON the car
Toiced this feeling with a few remarks about
what he would do in such q predicament:
My experience would teach me, said he, I
to sit still no matter who or how many got
Up; and if l could / would get good pur-
,hase upon some part of the car to keep me
rom beng hurled headlong when the shock
II coilision' came-by that window ledge be-
ween the motorman's cab and the car for
Instance. If you keep your head in time of
,eril you'll stand q far better chance of pull
ng through unhurt than the panic-stricken
nan who plunges and shrieks."
A Safe and Quiet Trip.
But there's not much need to speculate !
bout such matters, for the Duquesne cars
re well built and their brakes are, so q
nachinist who examined them yesterday
ellis me, thoroughly reliable. At first
irbral,es were used on the Duquesne
inc; they worked unsatisfactory owing
o one cause and another, and the
ordinary chain-brake was substituted. Now
he atrbrake is again being introduced, and
i've Duquesne cars were equipped with
yesterday, and all the cars will have air.
rakes before the end of the month. The
car made the terminus on the Els
Vorth avenue line in exactly 40 minutes from
street, it had been fairly patron
zed all the way out, considering the dull
ess between ii and II O'Clock. The return
rim 10, fla 1~y |