[PRCo] Too Nostalgic?

[Matt Barry]

Click on this link, and then scroll down to where it states:  "picture 
time!"
http://www.pittsburghtransit.com/index3.html
Note that the one caption for the 4th picture down is:  "Here is car 
1726 fighting its way thru town."
I have seen this kind of description over the years, to describe various 
scenes of the streetcars "struggling" to get through downtown traffic.  
It lends itself to the belief that the trolleys just could not compete 
or handle sharing the streets with any other vehicle.   

I recall leaving town -during rush hours - on the 42/38 to Mount 
Lebanon, in the early part of the 1980's.   I don't recall much of a 
fight or struggle to get out of town to the Smithfield Street bridge.   
Dipping back further in time, the 88 Frankstown made it's way of town 
quite nicely in the 1960's.    The replacement buses encountered the 
same auto and pedestrian traffic as the trolleys.   Pedestrians, I 
think, probably handled the trolleys passing by in the pathways better 
than buses, as they knew the cars weren't going to swerve over to the 
curb lanes unexpectedly, as a bus might.

I probably wax more nostalgic than most, but barring a subway that 
handles only rail transit, I don't see how our streetcars fought anymore 
than buses on downtown streets, and perhaps, might have handled town 
better in some cases.