[PRCo] Re: PRCo - "through?" lines

[Fred W. Schneider III]

I've trying to get the garbage in the inbox down to a reasonable 100
messages, and came across this.  Was it ever answered to Matt's
satisfaction?

I can give you what I remember but there are a lot better experts out
there than me.  You probably want to look at the Pittsburgh Railways
article in Motor Coach Age perhaps 20 years ago ... I think it was the
first in a series of maybe a dozen issues on PRC and the independent bus
lines in Allegheny County done by Ray Foley and Oliver Miller.  

Pittsburgh Railways had essentially three route classifications in the
1950s:
1.  Streetcar lines
2.  Feeder Bus Routes
3.  Through Bus Routes

The feeder bus lines actually were one of two categories - feeder bus
routes that served local neighborhoods and connected with car lines
(Manchester-Evergreen, for example connected the neighborhoods on the
former 12 Evergreen car line with the 8 and 10 lines at Perrysville Ave.
and East Streets, and then ran on down the other side of the divide into
Manchester).  But replacements for car service also tended to be on the
feeder bus list, such as the 227 and 228 lines to Millvale and Etna.

The through bus routes were often old Pittsburgh Motor Coach routes that
paralleled car lines on other streets but were faster than the cars and
generally had a higher fare.  For example, there was a PRC bus to Ben
Avon which I think used Ohio River Blvd. instead of California St. where
the cars were.  When the Penn Lincoln Parkway opened (now simply the
Parkway East in local lingo), PRC operated through buses over it.  There
was a Pittsburgh - Wilkensburg via Parkway bus, which I rode and then
transferred to an 87 Ardmore car on Ardmore Blvd to get to East
Pittsburgh ... that transfer saved me a half-hour.    

mrb190 wrote:
> 
> Now that I see PAT, in recent years, has created routes which go all the way
> from Bellevue to Highland Park, cutting through downtown Pittsburgh, it made me
> recall reading that the railways once had such routes....

Pittsburgh Railways had some one major crosstown line, a combination of
the old 54 Carrick - Oakland and the 77 Oakland-Bloomfield-North Side. 
The flying fraction (77/54) ran into the early 1960s ... a street paving
project split it and 54 (probably still called 77/54) later only ran to
Seneca and Gist in Oakland.

> Wasn't there a route which went from the Butler Street 62nd street loop, through
> town, and over to the South Side Carson Street loop (where route 50 once
> terminated)?

No, there was a 62nd St. - East Liberty line.  It simply connected with
the 94 and 95 lines at 62nd St, ran farther east on Butler Street, then
up into East Liberty.  I think it used Negley to Penn, than made a loop
in the northeastern part of East Liberty on Larimer and Paulson Sts.
It really could not be called a crosstown line in the definition of
something that ran completely across a major part of the city.
> 
> Does anyone know of any others?
>