New-York tribune., 1907-01-22
IYINS RAPS CONTROLLER.
Declares Municipality Must Buy
Back It's Franchises.

The municipal ownership Of the street railroads
and ferries predicted and advocated vital to
the city's welfare by William NJ WINS, speaking
last night before the Manufacturers Association
of New York at No. 19S Montague street. Brook
lyn He said in part:
No community in the world feels so acutely as
fnitely difficult than Is the problem in Lon
don. Here we have uniformity of race-no his
history OF municipal development. The 100000
the most extraordinary facts of organized society.
The grandparents Of four-ffths were born abroad,
phenomena Such Of n new peo
pies awaltng a@DsoFptlon @ presents an an e]mtreIy ENTIRE & new
lem in the broad sense. The majority of the peo-
The first duty is to educate the Foreigners We
suffering from a congestion Of the most intense
CLOSELY hacked as the East Side. the nopuIatioD
would be 2i2 100000 When tho untenantcd lands
occupied at the present average in the tenanted
districts, will have population of 40O00O00
The condition of the traffic the bridge is abso-
lutey criminal. The governments Of the cities OF
Manhattan and Brooklyn have failed in their duties
in this respect ever since the trouble began in the
We have come to this point: The problem seems
TO be insolube. BY the time our wise. sober. tired
and think that the only way to get relief is the
away with the old Rapid Transit Commission and
The property Of the city of New York is by law
inallenable S9-year lease Is not technically in
aenabe but but it's IT is practically S The old steam rail-
petual franchises. / think that the city should
make terms for the returning of the property to be
occupied by the proposed connecting railroad 10 the
city.
The railroads have capitalized their franchises
IN this city at 100000 The only thing that the
Legislature cannot change is the proprietary right
or the city in its ancient grants constituted before
the organization OF the state government.
Since 1880 the city has been buYing hack he dbclv
system which IL formerly disposed of and it is
only matter of time when ii VIII be compelled 10
buy back the perpetual franchises The control
of the outlets of traffic is absolutely vital
Let ask If you think OF turning the trans
portation OF the future into hands of a private
corporation? Every line Of railway constitutes one
of the highways of the city, they have no more
right TO be in the hands of private corporations
than the water system or the Health Department
The speaker then declared that the conditions OF
the Controllers Office little less than criminal
and defed any men to investigate the accounts and
figure out what they meant. publicity Inc de-
clared. 'is as lacking in the case OF the ac-
counts OF the French government prior to the Revo
luton. Every one is ignorant OF the yearly in
come from the water system, for instance They
only know that ii is expensive Still no one Wouid
care to 1t turned over to private Corporation
Speaking OF the figures the income since iSgs
from the municipal ferries he said that thew were
known only Ito God and the Controllers chief
bookkeeper eA
II would give the railroads short-te leases
and have the city build and equip future railroads
as u did the subway. The leases should not lie
made III after the construction of the roads. as
they are then vastly more valuable than BEFORE