[PRCo] PRCo Route 59
Dwight Long
dwightlong at verizon.net
Tue Jul 9 15:20:22 EDT 2013
John
Did the CTA use two man crews on the buses? I did not think so, but who
knows.
When I first started traveling to South America in the 90s (hey, that's
1990s for you smart asses out there) most of the buses were two man
operated.
Dwight
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Swindler" <j_swindler at hotmail.com>
To: "Western PA Trolley discussion"
<pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org>
Sent: Tuesday, July 09, 2013 1:17 PM
Subject: Re: [PRCo] PRCo Route 59
New Orleans had two man/women crews on St. Charles into the 'exact fare'
era. On a 1971 visit, the women conductors only job was to open and close
the door - maybe also give a 'two bell' signal. About all I recall of that
visit was: "this is beyond stupid". As a disclaimer, this biased
viewpoint was probably due to two summers driving buses for Chicago Transit
Auth.
> From: fwschneider at comcast.net
> Date: Tue, 9 Jul 2013 12:57:24 -0400
> To: pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org
> Subject: Re: [PRCo] PRCo Route 59
>
> The route cards ended near the onset of World War II when PRC realized
> they did not have the staff resources for such petty trivial things as
> keeping paper records of every little diversion. Those route cards
> showed everything…. If a fire downtown required a diversion for two
> hours, they were posted to the cards. If a route was altered over night
> so a switch could be replaced, the route cards were annotated.
>
> I did not waste my time typing every trivial detail. I only copied
> permanent route changes. In an era where where schools are no longer
> teaching children to read and write cursive, my objective was to create a
> file that dumbed-down people could read if they were no longer able to
> read the original route cards (which are in cursive).
>
> I did not have access to my old ERA Headlights magazines at the time.
> They had been moved to the library at Arden and I was temporarily in an
> apartment. I have inserted final abandonment dates but there are other
> things that I don't have such as when the northside routes were shifted
> from the 7th St/6th St loop to the 6th St. Bridge (it was sometime in
> 1957).
>
> I also created several ancillary files such as the dates that low-floor
> cars went into service on each route (they were usually in the route
> cards) and the dates that the lines were fully one-man.
>
> By the way, if anyone gives a s**t, the one-man conversions were a
> problem. There were sometimes dates posted in the route cards that
> conflicted with scheduled manhours. I went with the hours. When the
> weekday hours dropped to the point that it was obvious that the conductors
> had finally disappeared, I took that as the date. The system was
> completely converted to one-man in 1937 when the last trailers on West
> View - Belleview (10, 11, 15) were replaced by single cars on Feb. 8, 1937
> and route 13 lost its trailers 28 days later. Route 27 (Carnegie) began
> weekday one-man cars in 1931 but the crew hours on weekdays did not drop
> sufficiently to indicate complete loss of conductors until March 15, 1937.
>
> But the thing that amazed me about PRC was it had to be the largest system
> in the nation to begin conversion to one-man cars and perhaps the first to
> finish the job. The company attempted to put one-man cars on the Castle
> Shannon - Mt. Lebanon shuttle in 1920 but went back to two-man cars when
> the crews refused to work them. When they converted Bon Air, 36th St.
> Transfer and North Washington in 1923, the company's attitude was more
> along the lines of, 'we are the employer, you are the worker, you can work
> where we put you or find another job. By 1930 route 82, one of the
> heaviest lines in the system was fully one-man, seven days a week. Route
> 87 Ardmore, hauling people from Wilkinsburg to the Westinghouse Electric
> and Air Brake was one of the earliest conversions … November 10, 1924.
> Route 88 Frankstown went one-man between 1930 and 1931.
>
> Now think of Chicago … the last routes in 1958 were two-man.
> Philadelphia still had a small number of conductors in 1971. Illinois
> Terminal never ran a PCC without a conductor. Boston had those
> center-entrance cars that required conductors into the late 1940s. San
> Francisco had conductors into the late 1950s. New Orleans had the second
> man until the middle 1960s.
>
>
>
>
> On Jul 9, 2013, at 11:50 AM, Dwight Long wrote:
>
> > Fred
> >
> > The final change to route 65, other than its discontinuance as a rail
> > operation, was its extension from Munhall Loop to East Pittsburgh over
> > the former route 55 trackage. Not sure when this occurred (when the
> > Glenwood bridge was closed to trams) but it was in effect, AIR, until
> > the end of tram operations from Lincoln Place. I took pictures of the
> > operation in early 1965.
> >
> > Dwight
> >
> > From: Fred Schneider
> > Sent: Tuesday, 09 July, 2013 11:35
> > To: Western PA Trolley discussion
> > Subject: Re: [PRCo] PRCo Route 59
> > Route cards for route 506 Homestead and Homeville show the following (if
> > I transcribed it correctly) … never did find anyone willing to proofread
> > my work. There are certain dates such as 1930 and 1937 where they
> > simply listed the routes even if they didn't change so the dates are not
> > always indicative of a change unless it is so stated. Usually a change
> > only shows the specific streets that were changed. fws
> >
> > January 1902 … from a point in Homeville along a township road through
> > Munhall to 9th Avenue in Homestead and over 8th Avenue to Hays Street.
> >
> > 1917: From a point in Homeville-Greenspring Avenue, Ravine Street, 8th
> > Avenue to Hays Street.
> >
> > July 17 to July 19, 1919; August 29 to Sept 1, 1919 and August 18 to
> > August 22, 1919 … line split into two sections at bridge above Homeville
> > Siding because of unsafe condition of bridge,
> >
> > August 10, 1925: Length of line: round trip 5.23 miles.
> >
> > May 14, 1927 to June 19, 1927: Shuttle service from Terrace Step stop
> > to end of line, Homeville.
> >
> > Feb. 14, 1928: Route 506 combined with route 507 (Homestead-Mifflin).
> > One man operation began. See route 507 for history 1928 to 1944.
> >
> > July 9, 1944: Began operation from Homeville to 18th and West Streets.
> > Route 65 operating SE PCC cars from Munhall Loop to Lincoln Place loop.
> > Route 59 used double end low-floor cars.
> >
> > March 7, 1953: Last full day of route 59.
> > ______________________________________________________________________________________________________
> >
> > Original route 507 operated only November 1902. Have not found route
> > card.
> >
> > April 1, 1928: On this date, route 507 started under supervision of
> > Pittsburgh Railways Company using schedules and equipment formerly used
> > by Homestead and Mifflin Street Railway.
> >
> > August 24, 1928: Shuttle began operating between Lincoln Place and Main
> > and McWhinney, also Main and McWhinney and 8th Avenue, Homestead.
> >
> > November 21, 1928: Through cars Lincoln Place to 13th and West
> > Streets, Homestead.
> >
> > November 23, 1928: Through cars Lincoln Place to 8th and West Sts.,
> > Homestead.
> >
> > December 14, 1928: Combined with route 506 Homeville and one-man
> > operation began.
> >
> > January 1, 1930: Main St., Center Ave., Main St., Walnut Ave., 22nd
> > Ave., West St., Amity St., 8th Ave., Munhall St., Ravine St.,
> > Greenspring Ave. to Hays St. in Homeville.
> >
> > March 15, 1937: Lincoln Place along Interboro Avenue and Main St. to
> > West St. to 12th St., Amith., 8th Ave., Munhall Junction, Ravine St.,
> > Greenspring Ave. to High St.
> >
> > July 9, 1944: Homeville end split from Lincoln Place end and
> > designated route 59. Lincoln Place to Munhall loop designated route
> > 65. Muldfowney Loop in Lincoln Place opened this date permitting PCC
> > service on route 65 and the line was extended eastward a short distance
> > from Interboro Avenue to Muldowney Street.
> >
> > October 31, 1956 Transit Guide: Munhall to Lincoln Place over 8th
> > Avenue in Munhall and McKeesport, Amity St., 12th St., West St., 22nd
> > St., Interboro Ave. and private right-of-way to Muldowney Loop.
> > Unchanged from July 9, 1944.
> >
> > Sept. 5, 1965: Last full day of service route 65.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Jul 9, 2013, at 9:52 AM, Lattner, Raymond wrote:
> >
> >> Hello. I was looking at an older historic topo map and noticed that
> >> route 59
> >> traveled up Ravine Street and then split at the intersection of
> >> Greensprings Ave., Coal Rd and Black Path (road names based on Google
> >> Maps).
> >>
> >> One line continued up Greensprings Ave. to what is called Terrace and
> >> ends at what I believe is High Street and Bowes Ave. The other line
> >> on PRW seems to follow Duquesne Ave then Homestead Duquesne Rd to Coal
> >> Rd. to terminate at Coal Rd. Extension and Bellwood Rd.
> >>
> >> I have attached that section of the map. My first question is, is this
> >> correct? If so, how did these lines operate and what destinations
> >> signs
> >> were used? When did PRCo stop using the line to Bellwood Rd.? Maybe I
> >> have this wrong and it could be a coal mine RR?
> >>
> >> If this was discussed before I apologize.
> >>
> >> Oh, map web site in case some of you do not have it.
> >> http://geonames.usgs.gov/pls/topomaps/f?p=262:1:4149522851964442
> >>
> >> Thanks.
> >>
> >>
> >> Raymond E. Lattner
> >>
> >>
> >>
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> >
> >
> >
> >
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