[PRCo] Running_On_Time

[Jim Holland]

Good Morning!!

	A variety of ways to get  *equipment*  and their operators back on schedule.   *Many* 
times went thru the experience Fred has hinted at.   If cars were running late, operators
would switch cars mid route by supervisor instruction.   This did not involve extra
equipment but it got the operators back on their schedule without disrupting passenger
flow.
	Another way is to turn equipment and operator around.   An outbound 42-line car running
30-minutes late could turn at Neeld, but this involves putting people off the car.   PRCo
did not seem to follow this practice but instead had the operators change cars.   Remember
one time outbound on the 42-line and we had 3-different operators and there wasn't a shift
change at SHJ.
	SF used to switch operators from car to car to maintain schedules but gave that up
sometime in the 1970s and switched equipment and operator and they still follow that
practice.

	When we derailed at Bon-Air outbound on Mother's Day Sunday, 1961, I walked back to SHJ
and another car had already made another loop around downtown bound for Drake.   I got on
this car and we used the 38-line to Shannon and then on to Drake and we left Drake just
5-minutes late!   Express ride outbound on 38-Mt.Lebanon was spectacular  --  wide Blvd
truck route!

> Fred W. Schneider III commented:

> If an inbound interurban car was sufficiently late, even on a Sunday,
> another car would be pulled out of Tunnel car house and started on the city
> loop on the schedule of the late car.  The trainmen (correct PRC term, circa
> 1960) would trade cars after the replacement car had completed the city
> loop, maybe at P&LE, maybe Tunnel, maybe ...?  I was on the late cars at
> least a couple times  on Sunday/Holiday pass riding during early 60s.
> Knowing that the 'late' car would end up being a pull-in, I'd change cars
> with the operator.
> 
> In the "East End District" an emergency pole telephone (again correct term)
> was also located at "Craft Ave. Station-route foreman".  In late 50s (I was
> a younger witness to this) and maybe into the early 60s, a 76 car would be
> placed at Jane Street Loop during pm peak.  Well, maybe a bit earlier.
> Anyway, sometimes phone at Jane St. would ring.  Never thought much about it
> at the time, but now assume trainman was getting instructions from Craft
> Ave. route foreman to put a late running route 76 operator back on time.
> Trainman would depart inbound on 76 line, and sometimes return about a half
> hour or so later with a different car.

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James B. Holland

Holland  Electric  Railway  Operation.......
......"O"--Scale  St.-Petersburg Trams Company Trolleycars  AND......
............"O"--Scale  Parts  mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net

............Pennsylvania Trolley Museum (PTM) http://www.pa-trolley.org/
......Pittsburgh  Railways  Company  (PRCo),   1930  --  1950
N.M.R.A.  Life member #2190; http://www.nmra.org

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