The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1895-03-20

Hartford and Glastonbury. 80 pei
cent. of all business.
Between Derby, Ansonia and Biz
mingham, 80 per cent. of all business.
Between Ansonia and Derby 81 500 a
year.
Between Naugatuck and Waterbury
$500 a month.
Between Union City and Waterbury
$170 per month.
Between Waterbury and Naugatuck
so per cent. of all.
Between Winnipauk and South Nor
walk, so per cent.
Between South Norwalk and Winni-
pauk, 80 per cent.
Between NorWalk and Rowayton, SO
per cent.
Between Danbury and Bethel, rs per
cent. of all business.
Here you have the actual effects of
a few months only of the cheap electric
competition upon the passenger earn
in,gs of this property alone. Now, is it
right and fair to continue to extend
these parallel lines across desert
wastes of country, to connect town with
town, where the steam roads have,
at large expense, constructed and equip
ped their roads and furnished reason
able service and accommodation to the
! public especially without some great
and crying demand by the citizens
themselves and especially against the
protests of many of the residents of
these towns, who realize that the in
PRODUCTION of electric roads to these
suburban retreats will soon cost them
| of MOI =,
for the reason that they believed they
were escaping from the noise and dan
| ger of the trolley? Above all, do you
consider it fair and reasonable to sup
pose that the steam railroad will con-
tinue to furnish frequent train service
| at these stations at a constant loss? If
| you are to permit this destructive COM
| petition, made possible by the free use
of your highways to the trolley roads,
then in justice such towns must not
expect frequent train service from the
steam roads. The steam roads cannot
he used as a convenient conveyance in
cold or stormy weather. Is Milford
with $500 people and thirty-eight pass
enger trains a day to expect a contin-
uance of this service If it adopts two
electric roads? In self-defense it will
be obliged to withdraw many of it's
trains, and so the town will suffer in the
end as well as the railroad. All this
means cheaper service, diminished earn
ings. less ability to furnish first class
accommodation to the people of Connoc-
tcut, because some foreign syndlcates
think they can make money by monopo-
lizing the free highways of Connecticut
| ,trt, .,,1
private uses.
WHAT is THE REMEDY?
What is the remedy? To my mind
it is to confne electric railways to their
legitimate limits as street railroads.
What was the original conception and
design of a street railway? Was it not
designed and intended simply to take
the place of the omnibus or the hack or
the barge? And to be used simply as a
cheap and convenient conveyance with
in the city or town? The street railway
was never designed or intended to fur
nish transportation from one city TO
another All the old horse railroad char
tiers in this state which have recently
been galvanized into new life and en-
ergy by the infusion of the electric cur
rent were granted by the state with no
thought that they were to exist or oper-
ate beyond the limits of the town in
which they were located. This is the
proper limit within which this style of
transportation should be confined. The
city or large town and its immediate
suburbs should be the extent to which
street railway companies should be linn
tod otal ,fr .1rr sr
public necessity and a general demand
for the convenience by the people who
reside in these suburban resorts and
never against their protests. Neither
railroad spectators nor land speculat-
ors for their own private gain should
be allowed to force their accommoda-
tions upon people who do not ask them |
There Is money enough to be made by
the electric railroads within the cities |
and large towns and their immediate |
suburbs. To these limits they should |
be confined, and there they should be |
compelled to provide the same safe |
guards and NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. flag
men, gatemen, first class cars and ap- |
pointments-that steam railroads are |
compelled to furnish their patrons In |
other words, every application for a |
charter, which parallels an existing |
steam railroad outside the limits of |
city or large town. should be firmly re-
fused. The steam railroads should be |
allowed to do the business between the
towns which they can accommodate |
and through which their line has been |
built, and to accommodate which they |
have expended large sums of money
The facts I have represented to you,
it seems to me, are sufficient to satisfy
you that the time has come when the
should say to the promoters
Of electric street railways, THUS far
and no further" In regard to the i'm
mediate application before you propose
to consider them briefly in their order
as shown upon our map In regard to
any of these schemes which appear to
have been invented to sell to the highest
bidder, / assume the committee will
dispose Of quickly and effectually
In regard to these charters. as well
as to the extension of time for the
under any charters here
tofore granted, desire once more to
urge the committee to see to it that in
case they should report favorably upon
any of these charters, that they will
attach to them the standard amend
nent providing that nothing in any
such charter extended, amended, sor