Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-06-22
TRACTION MEN WANT AL SMITH
AS CAR OF NEW YORK TRANSIT
Point Unhesitatingly to
Governor 10 Solve
Huge Problem.
Page From Philadelphia
Book Is Being Taken in
New Project.
By j. c. EaYLE.

special ulsp3tch TO Inc star.
NEW YORK, June % A transpor-
tation car of New York may be
sought shortly in whose hands shall
he placed supreme control Of all forms
of passenger transportation. That
will he the eventual outcome of the
present traffic problems caused by ter
rife traffic congestion and disputes
over fares. according to some of the
most influential traffic men in the
United States. They put their fingers
unhesitatinGly on Coy. Al Smith as
the man to WELD the transportation
sCeptcr. They say that Philadelphia
now IS showing New York the way.
Efforts Of the Philadelphia Rapid
TRANSIT Co. under the management of
r. r. Mitten, to extend its control
over taNicab transportation in that
city took on added life today. Trans
portation men sec in this an effort on
the part of Mr.. Mitten to bring all
the passenger carrying lines of that
locality under one management. The
Philadelphia Rapid Transit Co. con.
trolls the surface car and elevated
lines.
To Start Phone Line.
It has gone extensively into the OPP
Grafton of buses, even operating lines
to New York and Atlantic City. 1t
will soon start pasSenGeE a1rplane
transportation between Philadelphia
and Washington. Early this year it
acquired the Yellow TaNicab Co., and
today it is quietly negotiating for all
but two of the other taXicab concerns
in that city.
Street railway men here assert that
Mitten is simply working along lines
that all of them have foreSeen even
tually must he adopted. They point
out that the most profitable and most
easily handled kind of passenger
transportation is that in which trans
fers from one line to another are cheap
and available.
: 1t is uneconomic. engineers contend.
to operate the various forms of urban
passenger transportation under dozen
different heads. They say. however
that the presentation of economic rea
sons to voters or riders is not suf
ficient. They believe the consolidated
lines must be in the hands of a man in
whom the public has supreme con-
fidence, and who would occupy ap
proXimately the same position as
Judge Lands in base ball or Will Hays
in the movies.
In support of this theory they point
out that the abandoning or shortening
of some street railway routes and in
PRODUCTION of more one-man cars in
Philadelphia for economic reasons al
ready has brought opposition from
patrons. In West Philadelphia 5000
citizens have threatened to organize a
boycott of the system.
More Economic Operation.
Transportation men in New York
assert that. sooner or later. the fact
that fares are now less than actual
cost Of carrying passengers and that
the difference is being made up in
directly through taxation. must force
more economic operation. The vari-
Gus branches of transportation must
be so svnchronized as tn make the
most Of traffic arteries. or congestion
will check and demoralize business in
general.
Some idea of the way this would
be worked out can be gathered from
figures presented to the Board of Es-
innate today by Gerhard NJ Dahl.
chairman of the board of the Brook
Ign Ma nhattan Transit Corporation.
He declared that buses operating
under favorable conditions on Fifth
avenue carried an average of 1876 900
persons each during the last year.
Surface cars averaged 1850 per-
sons per car per year. while in the
Bronx this average ran up to 1000
per car.
Nothing has come from Gov. Smith
to indicate he would accept COM
mand of the raction forces here. The
proposal has not been formally laid