New-York tribune., 1908-04-13
TRANSFERS.

Accounts of the first Gay operation OF tne
new rule doing away with transfers at large
number of points between the Third Avenue and
the Metropolitan street railway systems show
how important a part the transfers play in en-
abling the public to get about this big city, with
its trolley lines laid out at haphaZard. Do away
with all free transfers, as the street railway
managers apparently wish to, and the city once
more would be one Of magnificent distances,
with very poor means of communication, for q
multitude of citizens can pay only one fare to
make a trip from one part of it to another
What influence carfare mas on the distribution
of the population is evident TO any one who
attended the recent congestion exhibit, where
it shown by actual reports from factories
that only in the better paid trades could work
men afford to live far enough away from their
place of work to pay even 10 cents day going
to and fro, the poorer wage earners living within
walking distance of their shops and being il
hopeless factor of congestion. Now, a large
number of people have undoubtedly selected
their homes under the impression that transfer
arrangements were permanent, and TO them
doubling the cost of getting to work or COM
peling them to walk a long distance to save
the extra fare will be a real hardship. There
fore it is to be regretted that the receivers have
felt that in order to protect the interests Of
stockholders they had to do away with transfers.
and it is all the more to be regretted one of
the many incidents that tend TO keep up con-
stant irritation on the part of the public toward
the traction companies.
Every one knows what inconvenience and
hardship the change will be to many people, but
no one knows whether not it will be any real
advantage to stockholders. Only a few years
ago 1t used TO be the fashion to say that the
/ transfers promoted travelling in various ways;
| for instance, by dispensing the people further
| from their working places and causing family
and social visits, which would be made infra-
| quently at two fares, but frequently at One and
| that the companies protited from it; but now
all that is changed. and the system is held up
| as prime cause of bankruptcy. We have al
ready shown that the figures offered to prove
| that transferring causes the railroads TO carry
| passengers at about cents each are mislead-
! ing, being produced by counting each trans
! ferred passenger twice. If every transferred
! passenger would become two, paying two fares,
| the companies would undoubtedly profit greatly.
| but there is a strong probability that only
| small fraction Of such passengers will do so.
| In a vast number Of cases a man will walk. aud
| of necessity 4 considerable distance rather than
| pay twice to reach his destination. Moreover, a
considerable number will ride. but will not pay
the second fare, avoiding the conductor in the
! crowd with the feeling they are within their
| rights. Then. again, there are those who will
| avoid unnecessary trips as costing twice what
they formerly did. and so even the one fare
now received will be lost il these cases. Work
men will change their abOdes also in such way
as to reach their work at one fare. These ten
! denotes will reverse those toward the stimula-
ton Of traffic, upon which advocates of the
transfer system used to dilate There is reason,
therefore, to believe that those who think the
doing away with transfers will greatly increase
profits mistaken.
At any rate the results will be watched with
! interest as showing how much influence the
transfer system has had upon the present IN
| fortunate conditions Of the traction properties
It's effects may prove 10 have been grossly ex-
aggerated. Great complaint is made of losses
through the dishonesty of conductors, which are
placed all the way up into millions annually.
But has not the company's policy of getting the
! dividends out Of the straps been the chief cause
| Of that jamming which favOrs the dishonest COZ
ductor? He and not the company, it now ap-
pears, got the dividends that were supposed 20
! be in the straps Moreover in crowded cars
| the dishonest passenger, and his name is legion,
| according TO the experts, plays his game. Both
| the dishonest conductor and the dishonest pas
senger may be eliminated by the new pay as
you enter cars. But the companies clearly
| Overreached themselves in their determination
to give the public less than it could reasonably
demand for its money. The high taxes of which
they complain reflect, in part at least, the pub
| lie irritation. Perhaps those taxes ought TO be
reduced. Perhaps wiser management will do
away with some Of the present losses through
| dishonesty and through damage suits But i
| Will be matter Of general regret if it be shown
| that to operate streetcars prOftaby in New York
| transfers have to be abolished