[PRCo] Re: So you can't get to Pittsburgh?

[Jim Holland]

Good Morning!



>> Jim Holland wrote:

>> Actually, have Not ridden the current lrv and  *Never* 
>> would be too soon for me, but the rebuilt Overbrook has
>> definite interest Specifically Because of the History
>> behind it.



> Ken & Tracie wrote:

> On a purely emotional level, we're on the same page, Jim.
> But one thing I have always noted is had the bulk of the
> streetcar network been retained in Pittsburgh (or for that
> matter ANY of it in Los Angeles, Baltimore, Chicago,
> St. Louis, Kansas City, D.C., Brooklyn, etc.), change
> would have been inevitable.



	Have  Known  And  Believed,
		for as long as you have been living,
	that the  *Only__Constant__in__Life__is__Change!*



> Had reasonably priced PCCs been available through the
> 1950s and into the 1960s, a heck of a lot fewer
> air-electric cars would have survived into the 1980s
> in the cities that still used PCCs.



	True  --  if new cars were purchased.    But they weren't  -- 
they disappeared  --  market for new cars didn't exist.

	I don't really see where you are going with this, Ken; much of
what you say has already been discussed here before.   
TrolleyCar demise started in the 1930s, was staved from total
abandonment by WW2, but abandonment continued in earnest
thereafter.    Puts a big hole in the NCL theory, but there are
still those who believe NCL was solely responsible for trolleycar
annihilation.    Puts a hole in anyone purchasing new trolleycars
in the 1950s.



> Had Mr. Swift remained at the helm of PAT from Day One,
> even a pro-rail attitude wouldn't have stopped some of
> the abandonments, reroutings, changes in route
> designations, etc.    It's an unfortunate reality,
> but we can still hold on to our dreams.



	Pro-rail attitude can't even get some built today  --  and has
gotten some built that will be history shortly  (Buffalo?)



> K.


> P.S.- I wonder if we would have accepted early 1960s
> models of PCCs with dual or quad headlights and slanted
> "Fishbowl" style side windows? :-)


	Don't think trolleycars would have developed that way  -- 
improvements on the Picture Window car to one large window would
have been the next step.



<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

Waiting for a bus is as thrilling as fishing,
    with the similar tantalisation that something,
        sometime, somehow, will turn up. 
            George Courtauld

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

James B. Holland

• Holland  Electric  Railway  Operation....... 
  "O"--Scale St.-Petersburg Trams Company (SPTC)
	Trolleycars and "O"--Scale  Parts
		including Q-Car
	mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net

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

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>