[PRCo] Fw: comparison with Cleveland

[Harold G.]

-----Original Message-----
From: Harold G. <transitmgr2 at earthlink.net>
To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia..org <pittsburgh-railways at dementia..org>
Date: Sunday, March 27, 2005 11:13 PM
Subject: comparison with Cleveland


Greetings to all
 
Some more comments about Cleveland.   The entire fleet
looked this good..including PCC cars, big peter Witts, artics
and buses.  After Tom Fitzgerald, when did PRC look this good.?
 
Lets face it.  Part of PRC image problem was poor maintenance of bodies, 
paint and washing.
 
Cleveland looked good because their manager, Donald C Hyde,
understood this.  CD Palmer did not.   Its not about cost, its about
culture.  Johnstown Traction always looked good.  
 
Sorry to get emotional but PRC did not help built public opinion.
By the way, Milwaukee was equal or better than Cleveland.  To Ken, do you have Milwaukee photos to prove their high standards?
 
This has been my opinion from the 1950's.  Its not rail vs bus, its
clean vs dirty, its paint vs rust. Its maintenance pride vs shit.
 
When Harley Swift came over he was very sad about the
PRC trolley fleet.  His Harrisburg buses were spotless.
 
We had lots of well maintained buses in Pgh....Penn Transit,
Deere Brothers, Community, Culmerville, Ohio River, Shafer, Brentwood,
Oriole, Noble Dick,  The only bad ones were Burelli, Bamford and some of the mill buses in the Mon Valley.  Even there, little McKeesport Transit 
was spotless.
 

You can all be mad at me now.
Every manager who came from an independent could see this.
 
When National City went into LA, Phila, St Louis, etc they painted
 and cleaned every thing.
 
I hope you still like me.
 
 
Harold Geissenheimer