Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1918-12-11
Eurt1tttD Gfrat

Highway Commissioner ]. Denny
O'Neil's observations upon the .tre-
mendous growth of motor truck traf-
fic on state highways the last year
and the fact that movings of house
hold goods constituted a consider
ahle part of the traffic tnat came un-
der his notice during this summer
and fall open a very interesting line
for any one who takes the trouble
to look at the character of present
hour road transportation. Big
changes have occurred right under
our noses while we have had our
minds bent upon war work. There
is scarcely a day goes by but what
half a dozen Fittings" come into
Harrisburg, or go out, by truck.
They go up the Riverside Road,
over the Susquehanna bridges or out
the Reading Pike. Some of them
are of people planning to live here
or to get out, but the bulk of them
are of family goods which are in
transit. This moving business is
one of the most striking features
of the motor-truck traffic, and it
seems to be proof that the tendency
to get away from the old Central
Pennsylvania idea of April 1 as
moving day." noted some eight or
ten years ago in this column, has
been developing. Almost any time
that the weather is right is good
for fitting" And another item is
that quite a few of the things now
being handled by motor truck in
these movings are household goods
of fine type, the kind that no one
would send except by freight, or
possibly express, some years ago.
| Now handsome mirrors, big clocks,
mahogany, art objects and the like
are to be seen being moved by mo-
| tor truck, a means of tranSporta-
| tion between towns at which their
i owners would probably have stood
aghast before L. M. Bigelow rebuilt
the Riverside Road and an enlight-
ened public sentiment in Harris
| burg insisted upon paving Front
street to meet it and extending Der
ry street pavement to Poorhouse
| Lane. Some of the other oddities
of this interurban motor traffic IL
| lustrate the extent to which the
busy truck has displaced the rail-
road car, especially since govern
ment control came along and
brought about conditions which
need not be referred to here. There
is one silk mill at Sunbury, for
example, which sends its truck
| through here with shipments sew
eral times a week. Half dozen
firms engaged in the scrap iron
| bt siness have waved farewell to
| their old friend, the gondola car,
and now gather up their junk from
the country and back right into
their storage yards, doing away
with the collecting team and the
railroad car formerly needed to haul
several wagonloads from, say, Mill
lersburg to Lebanon. The gasoline
and oil trucks are about as close
to being pioneers in the game as
any and they have increased in
way unmistakable to an observer
of traffic, while the fact that Ian
caster county garden sass" comes
| to Dauphin county in trucks ana
that tons and tons of apples and
peaches were moved right through
Harrisburg from the orchards OF
| Cum mberland, Franklin and Adams
counties is significant. similarly,
large amounts of celery are brought
down the Susquehanna river ROADS
and as for potatoes they have been
handled in such truck loads as
never seen before around here. The
regular truck lines that go to New
York and Philadelphia and other
places will be interesting to talk
about some other day because they
] are growing to occupy place OF I'M
portance that railroad men are
commencing to study.
1t is q rather interesting thinS TO
recall that the last December which
was anything like the present, from
a weather standpoint, was hVe
years ago, and that in recent years
we have had pretty lively snow
storm by December 10. winter set
in early last year and was as Sc
we're in the early weeks as IL was
lin 1914. Last year, 1t VIII pc re-
called, the big SHOWS started IN pc
fore the fifteenth of the month'
catching some OF the deer hunters
! in the mountains and causing much
suffering because there never was
anv letup as far as cold and snow
were concerned until spring was
we'll on the way and few were really
nrenared for the weather conditions.
From what railroad men say and
what railroad policemen say In cor
roboration of them, there is not
4 ,onch stealing of coal considering
the large amounts that are hauled
through Harrisburg every DAY:
Last year, owing to the severity OIL
tbe weather there was some annoy
ance because of the way cars were
raided occasionally, but this year
there has not been much dong
along that line. The strict poiic-
ING and dangers in the yards nave
prevented much of the coal picking
Il that used to go on, while the gahss
that used to jump coal trains any
throw off coal have peen talrlS "eN
hroIsen ND within city limits.