The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1896-03-26
THREE CENT CAR FARES.
Several Large Cities Are CIamoring
for Them.
MAYOR PINGREE OF DETROIT STARTED


street railroads. The agitation of the
cheap fare question here has aroused in
terest all over the United States, and
the owners Of the new road and the city
officials have been in receipt of hundreds
of letters from cities east and west ask
ing news about the experiment. Word
comes that the Three Cent Fare associa-
ton of Chicago, which had become NOR
ibund after ten years of more or less
active existence, had been revived for
the purpose of agitating the question OF
cheaper fares in that city. Pittsburg has
the fever and is making overtures to the
Detroit people to build a railway there.
Philadelphia is up in arms against the
abolition of transfers and is discussing
municipal ownership of railroads. The
cent pebble of Detroit has started an
ever widening series of rings which
threaten to touch every large city in the
United States. Meantime the Detroit
Railway company goes merrily on sell
ing eight tickets for quarter and ham
ding most of the business which used
to be carried by the other line.
The Detroit Citizens railway is the
COm p6b1uS COhpduy IL nttO AO1 ) 01Ao d
virtual monopoly of the street railroad
business of Detroit. Year before last
a question about the term of its fran
chise was raised, and Mayor Pingree
began negotiations with the owners for
a reduction in fare to be made in ex-
change for legislation confirming the
franchise The company declined the
mayors proposition, preferring to take
- 10 no for
decision. 1t got a verdict, under which
it will continue to operate at a cent
fare, if it chooses, for 3 years more.
Baked in his effort to persuade the
old company to reduce fares, Mayor
Pingree turned his attention to & prop
osition for the construction of a new
road. Some capitalists saw possibility
of profit in a road which, being con-
structed at far less cost than the old
one, would not have such heavy fixed
charges to pay. The municipal assembly
took the matter up, and franchise was
granted for what is known all over the
United States today as Detroit's 3 cent
road. It is undoubtedly one of the fair
est street railway franchises ever grant
ed, and it's terms protect the interest Of
both the capitalists and the city.
The date of the ordinance is Dec. 4,
1894. 1t granted the Detroit Railway
company the right to build, maintain
and operate an overhead trolley railway
on certain streets, the rates of fare tic
be: Cash, 3 cents; tickets good from 8
.. m. to 5 40 a. m, six for % cents;
tickets good from 5 As a. m. to p. M,
eight for % cents; special tickets to
members of the police and fire depart
ments, 100 for so cents; no free trans
portation except to employees of the
company; transfer free between all
branches of the company's lines.
A II this sounds very nice and is very
nice for the people of Detroit, but there
is another side to the picture. Most of
the street railway companies in big
cities are compelled to do a great deal
of paving. In some cases only the pave
ment between the tracks must be main
tanned; in others the companies must
maintain also the paving on each side of
the tracks for a foot, or perhaps two
feet. In Philadelphia the companies
which obtained the privilege of chang
ing to the electric system bound them
selves to pave the streets from curb to
curb Cat an expense of $4,000 mile,
they claimed) and to maintain that paw
ing.
In Detroit, on the other hand, the new
railway company has no concern about
the paving, except to replace what it
disturbs in laying its tracks, and ON I'M
paved streets where its tracks were laid
the city supplied concrete foundation.
The Detroit company, therefore, can af-
ford to charge a lower rate of fare, for
its original expense in construction was
lighter and its obligations to the city
are not so heavy as those of other COM
panies. Of course the streets must DO
kept in repair by the city, and the cost
of this work. which in Philadelphia is
borne by the railway companies, in
Detroit falls on the taxpayers. So all
the taxpayers who ride in the cars pay
indirectly something in addition to the
- cents which the company charges.
This is the reply made by the old COM
pany to the showing made by the new
company.
1t has been proved pretty conc1usively
that the old Detroit company cannot
make money carrying passengers at 3
cents. 1t might have made a little at
that rate if it had kept a monopoly of
the business. But now that it must d.
vide its business with a new company
it cannot prosper. 1t must earn much
more proportional1y than the new COM
pany, because its road was constructed
and its plant put in when electric trac-
ton was comparatively new and costly.
The editor of The Street Railway
Journal recently sent a representative
here to study the situation, and he came
to the conclusion that one of two condi-
tions would make cent fares possible
the cheap construction of new lines
in rapidly growing communities or the
granting of a monopoly to some one
street railway company. The Toronto
roads are quoted as an example by the
advocates of cheap fares, but in Toronto