[PRCo] Re: 20 Rebecca & 17 Reedsdale Lines to be converted - temporary basis

[Fred Schneider]

On May 19, 2010, at 3:33 PM, Barry, Matthew R wrote:

> October 1951 - 20 Rebecca & 17 Reedsdale lines to be converted to bus, but only on a temporary basis - because of the Gateway Center development.
> http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=fwMiAAAAIBAJ&sjid=g00EAAAAIBAJ&dq=trolley%20buse&pg=5998%2C298779
> 
> 
> Continuation of story:
> http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=fwMiAAAAIBAJ&sjid=g00EAAAAIBAJ&dq=trolley%20buse&pg=1526%2C356403
> 
> 
> matt
Matt:

You wish to proof-read my typing?

By the way, route 17 was nothing more than a shuttle established when 20 was routed over the Manchester Bridge on June 1, 1925.    The original PA&M horse car ran over the covered bridge.   The steel Manchester Bridge was built with rails but nothing apparently used them until 1925.   So what you found here ... the bus being diverted over Shore Road was nothing more than a restoration of the original 112 Reedsdale route.

I have started to type the stuff you put on line.

Fred

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> 

Pittsburgh Press, Oct. 2, 1951, Page 1

 

Buses Sidetrack Trolleys on Two North Side Routes

 

Motor Coaches to Replace Cars No. 17, 20 on Temporary Basis; Conversion Hailed

 

   Pittsburgh Railways today bowed to Pa Pitt’s parade of progress and decided to try buses on two street car routes.

 

   Although trolley officials explained buses will be introduced only on a temporary basis on two North Side routes, some transit experts hailed the move as a step forward in the solution of Pittsburgh’s transportation crisis.

 

   Trolley routes set for conversion Oct. 15 are the Rebecca line (Route 20) in lower Manchester and the Reedsdale shuttle (Route 17).

 

   A City Council committee is expected to approve the switch to buses today.   Simultaneously, the Pittsburgh Railways will ask the Public Utility Commission to authorize the conversion.

 
   Railway officials said the decision to switch to buses came after they learned that construction in the Gateway Center necessitates closing the Fancourt St. loop used by the Rebecca trolley.

 

   Elsewhere, transit authorities who have been urging replacement of the City’s 1200 trolleys with buses rejoiced.

 

   But in asking City Council permission to switch to buses, Pittsburgh Railways insisted the door be left open for return of trolleys “if it seems advisable in the future.”

 

   In abandoning the Fancourt St. loop, the railways company asked City Council to set up another loop in the lower Triangle for use by the trolley firm if it decides to return to streetcars on the Rebecca line in the future.

 

    This loop will run from Manchester Bridge, through the lower Triangle, and back to the Manchester Bridge via Water Street.

 

    The railways will throw a switch into the tracks now swinging across the point Bridge so that Eoute 20 can return to the North Side via Manchester Bridge.

 

     “With this projected loop guaranteed us, we can always fall back upon trolley service if the buses prove uneconomical to operate on these routes,” a railways official said. 

 

    Buses on the Rebecca line will make pick-ups throughout the Manchester district, but instead of coming Downtown via the Manchester Bridge, they will proceed down Shore Ave. and General Robinson St. to Federal St.

    Then they will swing across the Sixth St. Bridge, down Penn Ave., around Stanwix St., and back to the Sixth St. Bridge via Duquesne Way.

 

    The present Rebecca route crossing Manchester bridge and making the loop around Fancourt St. and Barbeau St. must be abandoned to facilitate construction work in the Gateway Center, the railways said.

 

    Because buses will be operated along Shore Ave. and General Robinson St. – the present route of the Reedsdale shuttle – this line will be eliminated.

 

    “By eliminating the Reedsdale shuttle (Route 17), we expect some savings without any curtailment of service,” a railways official explained.

 

Answering transit authorities who favor wholesale replacement of trolleys with buses, he declared that the Pittsburgh Railways does not have enough buses “to operate a permanent fleet on these lines.”

 

    “Of course,” he added, “more buses could be obtained if it seems economically feasible to make these two routes permanently bus-operated.”