The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1899-05-06
OUTRAGED PEOPLE.
Topeka Avenue Residents Raise
Their Voices.
Resent Purpose of City Railway
to Ruin
A Handsomely Paved, Beau
tiful Boulevard.
WHO is IN CONTROL?
Are Corporations to Whom the
City Grants Privileges
To Recklessly Disregard the
Wishes of Citizens?
Will the City Assert Its Rights
and Protect the People?
WHO is IN CONTROL?
Are Corporations to Whom the
City Grants Privileges
To Recklessly Disregard the
Wishes of Citizens!
Will the City Assert Its Rights
and Protect the People?

The Topeka city railway company
seems anxious to make itself the most
unpopular institution in the city of To-
peka. They violate all sorts of ord1-
nances and orders of the city council.
They operate certain lines if they
wish to do so and decline to operate
them at their own sweet will. They tear
UP the streets and refuse to relay the
paVements.
They run old worn out cars with poor
motors and they permit their tracks for
month after month and year after year
to remain in most disgraceful and dan
gerOus condition.
The condition of many of the old over
head trolley wires are in a condition
dangerous to life and property
If the present company, as we have
been told so often, is not able to put ITS
line and equipment into respectable
physical condition, it ought to go into
liquidation and permit some new COM
pany to do it.
Instead of putting it's present lines
in decent condition, making some need
ed improvements and giving the people
of Topeka what they are entitled 10,
this company now proposes to add in
suit to injury by building a double track
on Topeka avenue, south of Tenth
street. The people along that whole
boulevard are up in arms about the
For ten years the people of Topeka
avenue have been trying to improve
that street. They have paved it and
this year they make the last payment
on their pavement and now the Topeka
railway company proposes to come IN
and run a double track and poles
through the center of the street The
parking grounds on this street were
made very wide and no provision was
made for a double track railway. If
these tracks are laid as proposed there
f%,,- Flfa-
tween the curbing and the tracks.
The Topeka railway company sets up
various reasons why they should make
this Improvement" they call it,
claiming among other things that they
wish to give the people a quicker ser
vice, particularly the residents about
Fourteenth street. The fact of the mat
ter is that nobody along Topeka ave-
nue. wishes these proposed tracks and
everybody is opposed to them. There
are lines on Tenth, Twelfth and Four
teenth streets now.
There is a line already out Jackson,
Twelfth and Harrison to Fourteenth
and Topeka avenue and beyond, but the
railway company refuses to operate this
cept when it wishes to, supplemented
by the presence of circuses and fair
ground entertainments.
The street railway company talks
about the abandoned track on Topeka
avenue remaining at the request of the
city. The city has repeatedly tried to
get this single abandoned track out of
the street, but the railway company has
continually complained of poverty and
asked the city to wait, wait. Nearly
year ago the city council passed a resO-
luton ordering the track removed, but
the railway company paid no more at
tentiOn to it than they would to an or
der from AguinaldO.
Isn't it about time for the mayor and
city council of Topeka to ascertain
whether they and the people have any
rights in the city of Topeka, or whether
corporations, which should be servants
of the town, are going to run the city
and over the citizens?
Isn't it about time for the city of To-
peka to compel the Topeka city railway
company to carry out some of the or
ders of the mayor and council?
If the street railway company can
force a double track down Topeka ave-
nue. the boulevard of Topeka, it can
also force a double track out the pro-
posed thirty foot pavement on Huntoon
street. But there are some things the
street railway company cannot do, un-
less the mayor and city council permit
them to do so and one of these things
is the putting in of a double track
down Topeka avenue
1t is held by many attorneys and by
members of the city administration that
the Topeka city railway company has
violated so many of the provisions of
city ordinances that should the city de-
sire to do SO it could declare its fran
chiSe forfeited.
and will be presented to the city council
next Wednesday evening, on which oc-
casion it is urged the property owners
on Topeka avenue interested in that
beautiful street will be present.
The original plan to run a line from
Tenth street south on Topeka avenue
will be carried out" said President c.
G. Baker of the City Railway company
today. "A double track, with iron CEN
ter poles, will be built from Tenth
street south on Topeka avenue to
Twelfth street From Twelfth to Four
teenth streets a single track with iron
side poles will be built making a con-
nectiOn with the fair grounds single
track at Fourteenth street. We wish to
give the people living in the new houses
on Topeka avenue south of Fourteenth
street a good service. The cars will be
run on the fair ground loop. The tracks
on Twelfth street from Topeka avenue
to Jackson will not be used and all
Quinton Heights and Washburn cars
will run out Tenth to Topeka avenue
and south of Topeka avenue to their
different lines, thus giving Tenth street
to Topeka avenue at least ten minute
schedule. The track connecting the
fair ground loop with the Twelfth
street line and the Twelfth street line
of Topeka avenue will be abandoned
THE immediate reason for building
the track on Topeka avenue is that the
city intends to regrade and repave To-
peka avenue at Twelfth and also at