Speed

[Jim Holland]

Greetings!

Derrick J Brashear wrote:

> If you lived along a busy road, you wouldn't let your kid run around near
> it, right? Why expect less of people who live along the rail tracks?

	Yes, Derrick, I most heartily agree, but I think you might have missed 
the point I was trying to make.  I grew up 1/2 block from the Raleigh 
intersection of the 42 DORMONT line; I worked at Potomac pharmacy on the same 
line on Potomac.  I walked the tracks back and forth as did  m-a-n-y  people.  
The streetcar line is literally in the back yards of many homes - very shallow 
back yards (not deep, long yards like on Norristown).  The Hillsdale grade school 
is just several blocks from the line.  I crossed the tracks to get to school 
4-times a day because we went home for lunch in those days.
	To reverse established habits is extremely difficult.  Don't know if PAT 
fenced the prw or not and don't know what efforts PAT makes to keep people off 
the prw.  The congestion is far too great and the crossings far too many for this 
to be anything but a home town streetcar line.
	Autos have to slow for school zones - anything that goes thru school 
zones has to slow.  There are many very young children on the streets who are  
l-e-a-r-n-i-n-g  how to be responsible citizens (hopefully).  Yes - the children 
must be instructed in railroad / streetcar safety, but as they are not yet 
mature, the rest of us have to watch out for them  --  autos and streetcars!
	The 42 DORMONT line between Potomac and the Dormont wye or whatever does 
not lend itself to speed.  Put the streetcar on an embankment in this area so one 
must crawl up to it or put it well below grade level in a pit and this would 
strongly discourage anyone from crossing the actual tracks.
	But the Dormont line is at grade where it is very easy for anyone - child 
or adult - to cross at almost any point.  And the last I checked, anyone who is 
driving does not have the  RIGHT  to hit anyone who walks in front of him 
irresponsibly.  This is a congested urban area and we are not dealing with a main 
line railroad.  Precautions need to be taken.
	Maybe we will go back to the PRCo days of running the 42/38 which 
terminates in Mt. Lebanon; then these people might get a seat in the rush hour.  
(My parents complained about this problem - Raleigh was the first inbound stop 
for the 42 - now it is the middle of the line and they can't get seats.  But they 
moved away - that settled that problem!)  And run the Drake thru Overbrook to the 
Village and the Library thru Overbrook.  Make a couple rush hour trips to Castle 
Shannon from the 42/38.  It worked before; it can work again!

James B. Holland
------- -- ---------
        Pittsburgh Railways Company (PRCo), June of 1949 -- June of 1953
    To e-mail *off-list,* please click here: mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net
N.M.R.A.  Life member #2190; http://www.mcs.net:80/~weyand/nmra/