The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-01-28
TROLLEY CAR SARDINES
STATISTICS SHOWING THE CROWD
ING OF PASSENGERS LAST NIGHT.
Even the Weather Straw Has
Been Since ..PerpetuaI-
Rights We're Discovered.

Last night a half hour before the shops
closed until a half hour after the last tired
store clerk quit his work to make his way
homeward the best he could, people strug-
gled 10 get a foothold on the Citizens
Street-railway Company's sardine cases.
Every car that turned off Washington
street was SO crowded that the lights from
the incandescents in the car could hardly
find space between the human beings to
throw its beams to the street outside. Be
tween most Of these cars there was double
the wait which the schedule calls for. and
the suffering people had TO stand on the
corner and educate themselves up to the
misery which the ride home entailed.
Il suppose said one man who waited
twenty minute at the postofiiCe corner for
a Pennsylvania-street car, that the COM
pany cannot find enough men to run the
cars, else they would run more of them.
Car after car without a trailer has passed
this point during the last hour, and on
every car were men straining and clutch
ing at the platform hand rails to keep from
being hurled to the pavement"
Just then a ma~n-evidently a mechanic or
a laborer, from his dress-stepped up and
begged the waiting passenger. in the name
of God, to give him a nickel or a dime
that he might get something to eat. No
work-not a job anywhere. There are
many of US poor devils hunting for work,
and we amt buns, either" he added to his
plea.
NO doubt" the prospective passenger
went on, after the hunger-stricken man had
muttered his thanks and moved away, no
doubt, L say, this Is the reason the COM
pany incommodes its patrons. Not enough
men idle to man these t~railers, l am sure.
L see by the papers that the financial pa
pers of the East say the Citizens Street.
railway Company's receipts have increased
so much that there are prospects of the
stock looking up. 1t seems TO me the COM
pany would PUT on more cars and take in
more money. That's the logic of the sit
uation.'
Rats calculated a friend. That's a
poor idea OF logic. If ninety people will
crowd into Il car built for thirty people,
and pay cents fare, where is the logic in
providing three cars? The company is not
in business for its health, nor for its pa
irons health, either, as you can well see
by the way it breeds disease in making
stock cars of it's rolling stock. Why, the
money they save one night on the College
avenue line alone would enable tnat
man Werner TO buy one OF his Wine
suppers for twenty legislators, if ne could
ina that many VINO would accept MS con-
terminating hospitality"
1t is recalled py several passengers who
have been using the street cars in this city
for the last n1leen years that a lew years
ago on cold lays like those OF the week
past the street-car company covered the
floors of the cars with straw, ana this
small accommodation was welcomed. Even
the straw mas been forgotten since the COM
pany discovered that 1t has q perpetual
franchise TO the streets of the city. In
Chicago electric cars are as warmly heated
as a drawing room, and this is done by a
simple heating device, the electric current
furnishing the heat. The device Is placed
under the seats, and the cost of supplying
the neat beyond the first cost OF the de-
vice is practically nothing. An Ordnance
Will probably be introduced at a near meet
ing of the City Council requiring the COM
pany to heat its cars in this city during
Last night the cash-fare registers of the
Coliege-avenue ears going north, from $50
o'clock on, We're noted. The cars seat
was shown: Car No. 50l had ttuy-siX pas
sengers, sixty on No. 549, sixty-two on No.
sos, hfty-one on No. 500, seventy-elght on
BrightwOod and Columbia-avenue lines the
boxes are about the size of those used in
the days of the mule, and each Will contain
about twenty-five people by crowding. Yet
car No. 343 had nifty passengers and No.
157 had forty-two. Car No. Oh on the Cliff
~ford-aVenue line had eighty-SeVen paSSen-
had to stop the cars for five minutes while
he jumped off and collected from men who
We're dragging DenlIu OH TIC uIdM DdT,
the brake and the hand rail.
ON Prospect street car No. 5Zl, which left
Washington street last evening a little
after & o'clock, it was difficult to count all
the passengers. on the platform nineteen
people were crowded. many hanging on
merely by their hands and toes. Before
the car reached the end OF Virginia avenue
twelve people of those who were packed in
side had left it. There were then seated in
the car twenty-nine people, which. with
those who had left il and those on the plat
form, made sixty. Nhere were standing in
side the car fully as many as We're seated,
which made a total of eighty-nine who
were on the car when it left Washington
street. One woman said the only consola-
ton she could find for the inconvenience
of being jammed so usntIy between two
men that she could not move was the fact
that she was kept warm. This crowded
condition of the evening cars is not simply
an execution due to the cold weather, but it
is a common occurrence on the cars leav-
ing down town at 8 o'clock and for q half
hOur before and after.