[PRCo] Re: Routes that Could Have Been Retained

[Fred Schneider]

The last time I saw any figures as about 1950 when General Electric  
published data which showed that if you ran your trolley often enough  
with full loads ... often meaning every five minutes ... it was  
cheaper than a bus.   Trolley buses were optimal in the 6 to 8 minute  
range, but as riders disappeared they walked right into that window  
and out the other side almost over night.

The rail car needed to support is own infrastructure ... substations,  
overhead lines, rails, and in a period of private enterprise, and a  
heavy dollar load for street paving and snow plowing and whatever  
other taxes a city felt compelled to add to the burdon.   In  
Baltimore in was one penny in five went to a park tax.   In  
Washington the trolley company paid for a policeman at every  
intersection where two lines crossed.    The bus had none of the  
overhead, power distribution and rail expenses and thus could operate  
at a lower cost per mile (or lower cost per passenger) under lighter  
loads.

With apologies to those who work in the field (Herb Brannon and Jim  
Holland are on the list), labor is today the the most expensive  
component of operating costs because we have wiped out all the other  
costs.   In 1890 labor was very high because we were running 25  
passenger cars with two people;  today we are running buses with one  
driver and three to six people in them in many cities.   We have not  
advanced all that far.  But in the busier cities, with one person  
running an articulated car and handling 200 people, labor is  
cheap ... but that is an unusual situation.

Is rail cheaper than bus?   Only if you have enough people riding to  
make it cheaper.



n Oct 7, 2005, at 4:37 PM, <mtoytrain at bellsouth.net> wrote:

> When PRCo/ PAT decided to wipe out trolley lines, was there any  
> opposition by the general public?
> I was living here in Florida and I know I would have stated what i  
> felt needed to be done.  Cost for
> cost, is it not true it costs much more to operate a Bus than a  
> street car?
> Philly has a new type of trolley, (single unit) what is the cost  
> comparison of one of those units verses a new gas gussiling bus?
>
> Jerry Matsick
>
>