Pittsburgh Rys 101

[EDWARD H. LYBARGER]

As one who was actively (but necessarily quietly) opposing the Sky Bus
proposal, I'm all too familiar with what was going down at the time.  But
that's what life is all about...money and power.  I don't have to like it to
recognize it.  The biggest problems generally occur when things are turned
over to government to run because the private sector has been beaten down by
the politicians, and that's what happened in Pittsburgh.  If we'd poured the
money spent on Port Authority into the private operator, we'd have had a lot
better transit at a lot lower cost, and the government would have been
collecting income tax from them to boot.  Government is NEVER the low cost
provider of anything.

But if the job of the guys there was to attack you in order to get their job
done, so be it.  I saw our job as attacking them, and the last time I
looked, we don't ride the Sky Bus to the city.  Instead we ride a slow,
inefficient, extremely costly country trolley line that features dirty
cars...largely because the government's in charge and no one gives a damn.

But more to the point...no one could have made an economic case for
retaining any but the South Hills car lines.  Replacement cost was
prohibitive, and patronage was/is too low.
----- Original Message -----
From: Jim Holland <pghpcc at pacbell.net>
To: <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
Sent: Sunday, July 11, 1999 5:46 PM
Subject: Re: Pittsburgh Rys 101


> Greetings!
>
> It is a given that a business needs to offer goods/services at a
> reasonable price to produce a return on investment (profit) - get these
out of
> balance and there is a good chance the business will experience losses and
> possibly bankruptcy.
> This applies to street railways and PRCo.  It is also a given that the
> physical plant or infrastructure for streetcars wears out and is mighty
> expensive to replace.  It is also easy to see that it would be less
expensive
> (short-term) to replace the streetcar lines with ({[buses]}) than to
rebuild the
> physical plant.  So it is inevitable that most streetcar lines would be
replaced
> by ({[buses.]})
> But that is not to say that *any* method of achieving this goal is right
> and correct.  A case in point:  SF Muni was formed as a city transit
system in
> 1912 and directly competed against the private-for-profit Market Street
Railway.
>  Being part of city government, laws were passed that were prejudicial -
> favoring Muni and against Market Street Ry.  These same laws today would
> probably be considered illegal even though the end result was
beneficial(?) for
> The City.
> Then there is an emotional side to the battle.  Fans exist for old
> buildings, all forms of transportation (planes, trains, ships, streetcars,
> ({[buses]})), for various aspects of nature, etc etc etc.  Each
passionately
> wants preservation for certain items.  Fans of ships might not be Willy
The
> Whale fanatics, but hopefully each fan could understand the cause of the
other!
> **You  *-*Yourself*-*  have said that you are NOT a Railfan.**   I AM a
> railfan as are many on this list.  The above discussion reveals that I
realize
> that streetcars would eventually be replaced (*everything* has its day and
then
> *everything* passes into history), but the methods of the early ({[PAT]})
regime
> and their leader who openly belittled  n-o-t  o-n-l-y  railfans but also
the
> riding public who preferred streetcars is not acceptable.  Neither is your
> statement here:
>
> >> Ed Lybarger wrote:
> >> 10) "Everything 'evil' in PAT?" Come on, now!  This
> >> is froth of the worst kind.  These people were doing their job
> >> as they saw it.
>
> And I am sure that most people on the list have had a less than
> desirable experience at some firm only to have an employee say:  "Hey,
man, I am
> just doing my job!"  While that phrase can be a reason, more often than
not it
> is nothing more than an excuse.  DON'T  BUY  IT!!
>
> Don't you remember the bitter battle of the skybus?  Don't you realize
> that  N-O  rail transit would exist in Pgh today had the Feds not
intervened?
> Don't you remember that streetcars were scheduled for abandonment before
buses
> were on hand for replacement - so eager was PAT to get rid of the
streetcars?
>
> --
> James B. Holland
>        To e-mail *off-list,* please click here: mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net
>               PITTSBURGH RAILWAYS COMPANY (PRCo), June of 1949 -- June of
1953
>       Pennsylvania Trolley Museum (PTM) member #273;
http://www.pa-trolley.org/
> N.M.R.A.  Life member #2190; http://www.mcs.net:80/~weyand/nmra/
>