New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-11-29
More Delay, More Deaths
The Loss the Public Suffered When
West Side Plans Were Quashed

To the Editor of The Tribune.
Sir: Your editorial deploring indefinite
further delay of any West Side track i'm
provement as the result of the political
juggling Of which this public question has
been made the victim for over ten years, by
its straightforward statement of facts may
serve to open the eyes of some New Workers
to what the city has lost through brazen and
INSCRIPTIONS operations of politicians in the
Legislature, the Board of Estimate and the
local political arena.
Over and above the strenuous assertions
of the various obstructionsts, who must now
Justify their actions and whose arguments
largely are hair-splittng over construction
Of words, towers the fact that the net result
is that they have won for the city another
bunch of lawsuits, that the city still stands
perpetually enjoined from touching the
tracks that have been in use there for sixty
years and that confessedy there is no pros
pect of any improvement being begun for
many years. To any one familiar with the
day day workings of the Public Service
Commission, the Interstate Commerce Com
mission and local governments in their rela-
tions with the railroads, the assertion that
the New York Central might get beyond the
control Of the public authorities is amusing
As time goes on the loss suffered through
the defeat of the plan for vast railroad i'm
provements on the West Side of Manhattan,
which the Mitchell administration by arduous
labor and consummcte skill and persistence
in prosecuting the city's interest achieved,
will become constantly palmer All indie
pendent Investigators, citizens without politi-
cal axes to grind or personal ambitions to
1.
pronounced the plan of 1916 fair to the city,
a complete cure of existing evils, of immense
benefit to the public and not only reten-
ton of every existing municipal right and
property. including waterfront, but recapt-
ure and re creation of much water frontage
and park acreage for public uses, with alb
sence of any monopoly or obstruction TO fur
Their extensions or to competition in future
either by the city or by other companies.
The railroad company has owned outr'"h'
most of its rght-of-way along the West Side
for over sixty years, having bought the land
when it was desoate COW pasture or marsh
and New York was town terminating at
Thirteth Street. Both city and state actively
aided by legislative acts to secure the build
ing of railroad that would connect this city
with the outside world via Albany. and the
city fathers in resolutions congratulated and
thanked the railroad officials and all con-
cerned for the prompt and efficient creation
of the utility.
The courts, up to the highest in the state.
have confirmed the railroads permanent
rights. and to accomplish any rational plan
of improvement there must be a mutual
agreement between the city and the railroad
company which recognizes the mutual needs
and rights OF both, with enlightened recog-
milton also of the responsibility of public
service. The Mitchell administration exacted
and ultimately procured the agreement OF
the railroad to concessions Of its right and
properties which unbiased students Of the
question have declared made the terms most
liberal. In fact, eminent railroad experts of
numerous other companies than the New
York Central have said privatel that they
could not see how the Central could expect
10 "break even" much less make dollar Of
additional profit, within any reasonable time
through its outlay of upward of s60000.000
to carry out the 1916 plan to which il agreed.
Local "bolsheviki," headed by the foremost
dcmagogue of America, who recruited a bunch
Of crafty and interruptions ofIiceseekcrs,
together with all the scattered dreamers, NAL
contents, chronic DIRECTORS, Impractical theo-
ris's and cheap notoriety seekers-though in
a miserable minority both Of numbers and
Of permanent civic interest-succeeded by