The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-08-30
What a Dual Tele.
phone System Has
Done Elsewhere.
Do THE CITIZENS WANT IT?
Business and Professional
Men Must Pay For
Competition.

dermen to consider the advisability of
granting the Worcester Telephone Com
pany a franchise, are reading the pa
pers these days, they are learning as
much as they could on junket.
They must have read that the auto
matte, or Stronger proposition, has been
turned down in Concord, N. H, and in
Salem, after a long and exhaustive in
vestigation by the city councils, in
which they reached the same conclu-
sion that every one has who has looked
into the matter of telephone competi
ton, that it is competition only in name,
and results in greater cost for telephone
service instead of less
In those cities where independent tele-
phone companies have been granted
franchises, and telephone subscribers
have been annoyed by double service,
it has followed that the companies
have not prospered. The history of the
telephone business shows that such
companies have almost always changed
hands within two or three years after
they were started. In remarking upon
the fact that 16 independent telephone
companies had sold out in the south,
the Boston News Bureau of July q
said:
"a prominent independent telephone
company promoter stated in New Or
leans recently, that the money was in
building, not in operating, telephone
exchanges and that when the time
came to operate the one in that city,
he would be somewhere else"
The Atlanta, Ga, Independent Tele-
phone Company was quoted at the
hearings in this city, some weeks ago,
q q OH Gh ING pNya Of
what an independent telephone COM
pany could do. If the aldermen have
read their papers carefully since, they
have learned that it has gone the way
of other independent companies. 1t is
now in the hands Of a receiver.
The aldermen can obtain considerable
enlightenment on the subject of indie
pendent telephone companies from a
perusal of the veto message of Mayor
Jones of Kansas City, Mo-, in which he
turned down the ordinance grantirg d
franchise to an independent telephone
company in that city. His veto was
sustained. The same alluring appeal
was made to the city council of Kansas
City as elsewhere, namely, that compe-
tition in telephone service was a good
thing because it reduced telephone
rates. Mayor Jones made an exhaust
i've study of conditions in other cities,
Il have investigated as far as practi-
cable the results of the construction of
a dual telephone system in other large
Cities and with the exception of the
city of Detroit, where, l understand, a
rate war EXISTS for the purpose of try
ing to eXterminate the new company,
there is not, 1 believe a large city in
which the construction of dual tele-
phone system has reduced the price of
telephone service.
In the city of St. Joseph, NO., the old
company was furnishing service at $50
year for business telephones About
three years ago the council Of that city
granted a franchise for a dual tele-
phone system and fixed the maximum
rates to be charged by the new COM
pany for business telephones at $40.
Since then the two systems have been
in operation. The old company has
neither lost subscribers nor reduced
rates, but is still charging the same
which it charged before the dual sys-
TEN was constructed. A large portion
of the telephone subscribers in that city
especially business and professional
men, have been forced to pay for double
telephone service by taking a telephone |
from both companies, because it was
found that no one system had all the |
subscribers. The cost of telephone ser |
therefore been increased from $50, the |
rate charged by the old company, to $50, |
the combined rate of both companies, |
and this state of affairs has continued
and exists in that city to this day as the
result of the construction of the dual
telephone system.
I'm the city of st. Louis there exists
dual telephone system. The charges
of the old company before the construc-
ton of the dual system were and ever
since have been $100 for business tele-
phones. The rate of the new company
is $50 for business telephones. Neither
company has reduced it's rates. The old
company, 1t is claimed, has as many
subscribers as it ever had, but an adj
ditional burden has been placed upon
many of the subscribers, especially the
business men, by making it necessary
for them to patronize both companies
at the combined rate of $3.50, instead OF
500, the price they were paying before
the construction Of the dual system.
I'm the city of Topeka a dual tele-
phone system was constructed, but af-
ter struggle for existence was sold |
out at receivers sale. The same or
similar conditions have resulted in 9TH |
er large cities from the construction of
a dual telephone system; and in my
opinion the construction of another tel |
6puOne SYSTEM llllS CITY WOulu EtSull
in tearing up our streets and pavements |
and increasing the poles and wires with |
which the streets and thoroughfares |
are already burdened without any re-
sulting good to the public or to tele- |
phone users, to say nothing Of the nui-
sance that would result to subscribers |
from the operation of two systems.
"A dual system cannot be made eff |
fective or result otherwise than in an
of the cost of service, until the
subscribers of both systems are thu
same and then service of one system
can be dispensed with. This has been |
found practicable in small cities or
towns where the amount of telephone |
service required was small and the !
number of subscribers few and they |
could practically all agree to patronize |
one system. But such an agreement is
or has never been effected |
in the use of "a dual system in large |
city where the amount of telephone SER
vice is very extensive"
The history of the telephone business |
does not extend back so far but that |
it is easily looked up. 1t shows three
things:
That competition in telephone SER |
vice is not good thing for any city.
That 1t costs those who use the tele- !