El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1915-02-27
bus. as a term, is approx
mately three months old" says

Motor Age. Recent agitation
of motor vehicle passenger transporta-
ton at low cost seems to have come
from the Pacific coast, where some
few months ago, the streets Of the ma
ior California cities suddenly became
flooded with small four and five pas
senger cars which would take passen-
gers anywhere within the city for five
cents, a sum slangily known in the
west as a jitne.
LOS Angeles seems to have been the
first to take up the jitne bus to any
extent. and in the three months since
its appearance on the streets of that
town over 1000 vehicles have entered
the. service. San Francisco followed
last month and now has an association
Of iitne men representing more than
200 cars. In Austin, FL Paso, San An
tonic and New Orleans jitne buses are
doing a large business.
Though the term was first applied
to the smaller cars of not over seven
passenger capacity, it has become eX-
tended to take in the class of service
generally known as motor buses-that
is motor cars carrying 20 or so pas
sengers running on regular routes and
regular schedule and charging five or
10 cents fare. DetrOits new service.
inaugurated this week by the Detroit
Jitne Bus company, expects to have 81
in service early in the summer. chi
Cago has a very definite movement on
foot toward a comprehensive service
of motor buses, and st. Louis has Just
been invaded by the Jitnes.
Naturally enough. traction interests
are very much aroused over the IN
vasion Of the new bus lines and they
are quite loud in their condemnation
and in their prophecies of failure. In
Los Angeles, more stringent regula-
lions are demanded of the city council
In Texas, the street railway interests
are appealing to the legislature for re-
lief from the tremendous inrOads the
jitne buses are making into their earn
ings
Traction interests throughout the
country freely predict bankruptcy for
the operation of the cars viii greatly
increase the number Of accidents.
Neither one OF these prophecies seems
likely to be fulfilled. If We take the
New York service for an instance, the
mortality records refute the statement
that the buses are more dangerous
than street cars. For the fiscal year
1911, the latest figures Obtainable, the
surface lines on Manhattan Island
killed 20 persons and injured 11,5OO.
The Fifth avenue bus lines, which equal
in mileage two percent Of the mileage
Of the traction companies. killed none
and injured 81 The street cars in
jured one person in every Il, 600 miles,
as against one person in every 10000
miles for the buses. or about seven
times as many per 100, 600 miles. Sim
liar figures on the London buses show
them so percent safer than the street
cars.
Traction interests urge that install
lation OF motor bus systems will great
" increase traffic congestion. Such,
however does not seem he horne
out by the figures of the London board
Of trade, which show that for the 10
years elapsing between 1903 and 1913
the number OF journeys taken by Lon
doners over the streets increased 100
percent without a corresponding in
crease in traffic. This, the London
board of trade holds is due to the pre-
dominance of motor traffic. which is
about 81 percent of the total traffic in
London"