Great American Streetcar Scandal

[Russix]

^To New Horizons

They really had no idea that freeways would spawn the suburbs and not rebuild the cities.

[Fury13]

The appeal of buses to people in charge of public transit was simply lower cost. Most people, though, preferred to ride streetcars if they were available. Buses ride much rougher than streetcars, and they emitted strong, foul smells in the old days. As a kid, I remember many times getting nauseated at the smell of the fumes, which affected you whether you were on the bus or standing on the curb as one rolled by.

Most important for metro Detroiters: the buses became stigmatized -- in other words, you only rode a bus if you were poor [[translation: a loser who couldn't afford to buy a car). And perhaps it's unfortunate, but buses won't shake that stigma anytime soon. On the other hand, streetcars and subways are generally regarded by middle-class metro Detroiters as viable transit options -- if only they were available on a frequent basis and traveled near desired destinations.

It's a no-brainer: build rail vs. expanding the bus system or instituting rapid bus lines. People WON'T RIDE buses. Put the money where your ridership will be.

[MikeM]

The appeal of buses to people in charge of public transit was simply lower cost. Most people, though, preferred to ride streetcars if they were available. Buses ride much rougher than streetcars, and they emitted strong, foul smells in the old days. As a kid, I remember many times getting nauseated at the smell of the fumes, which affected you whether you were on the bus or standing on the curb as one rolled by.

My mother rode the street cars from downtown to Redford daily. She complained about them being crowded, hot and smelly in summer, and nauseating. She would often get off somewhere along the way, walk for a distance to clear her head, then get back on down the line.

[Trainman]

I don't remember seeing busses in the Future 1960 documentary. I don't remember seeing traffic jams in the film. I don't remember seeing cities left in decay for reasons of the factories [[GM) leaving the area and taking it's tax base with it. The film was correct in saying how expressways were built through [[slum) areas of these futuristic cities of 1960. Yes the trend was toward busses. GMC had once manufactured them. Firestone had made the tires. Standard Oil had provide the gasoline. Then the busses had started to become unreliable in the 70's and people purchased more cars still benefiting the three corrupts companies that I had named. Imagine if Detroit had some type of transit such as light rail or a subway that was put in place 40 yrs ago. People would still be able to get around more freely without a car. Dave Bing is nothing but a puppet for these companies. So was Coleman Young, Dennis Archer, and the clown Kwame Kilpatrick. You could throw in John Conyers with his scandalus wife, Carolyn Kilpatrick, Granholm [[the worst Governor of Michigan) and the Levins.

The real puppets are those who will be voting YES for the SMART property tax renewal next August and not Dave Bing.

It’s no longer 1969 or 1989 or 1995 but now late 2009 and Wal-Mart is the new GMC that has taken over in profits and China is the new Firestone that makes most of the products Wal-Mart buys and the new Standard Oil Company is the freeway lobbyists who sleep in bed with the transit tax advocates including the Transportation Riders United as they won’t fight the freeways by voting NO next August at the time of this post.

It will be 2010 soon and it is far too late to protest the large $2 Billion dollar freeways soon to tear up what’s left of Detroit to fuel new growth in northern Oakland County and other places where people live in mansions and drive large cars unless we contact SMART and DDOT and get them to fight the cuts in Lansing but they won’t because they don’t have to with your support of their tax renewals.

Without your vote of NO next August, the large monsters will be coming in 2011 and no amount of public protesting or support for taxing fast food will be enough to stop the urban decay of Detroit and more new Wal-Marts built in farmlands, forests and filled in wetlands further destroying our environment and little reason for good paying employers to come to our state destroying any decent chance for our state to recover from the bad recession.

Why would any company come to Michigan with large freeways and no mass transit except disjointed high cost bus service such as SMART or the broken down DDOT desperate to keep state funds or siphon off suburban taxes to replace what’s left of state fuel tax funding after the SEMCOG freeway projects get their big fat portion of our limited transportation tax dollars.

Soon, Detroit will be like Sao Paulo, Brazil with vast slums and large freeways connecting the areas of wealth, if we do nothing to stop the monsters that are coming in 2011.

[Russix]

http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...verAvenue.html

^GRAND RIVER AVENUE:
DETROIT'S PUSH TOWARD
RUBBER-TIRED TRANSIT


Proponents of rubber-tired transit considered Grand River
Avenue in Detroit as a major victory for their cause. In 1946,
U.S. Royal Tires even featured a D.S.R. Grand River express
bus in its Fleetway Tires advertisement.
[[Photo courtesy of Tom's Trolley Bus Pix—Detroit stuff)

In 1946, the DSR's Grand River line could easily be ranked
as one of the busiest streetcar lines in the city. With peak
hour service requiring approximately 50 of the Peter Witt
style streetcars to operate along its 14.1 mile route from
downtown to Seven Mile Road, it's no doubt Grand River
was a major DSR streetcar route. However, Grand River
would also soon become a political battleground—-where
the proponents of rubber–tired transportation would
soon claim that roadway as one of their major victories.


I'm sure the website owner is a poster here, has to be. But I was browsing this website and found this new article on here. The picture of Grand River and Warren is amazing. I've spent alot of time waiting on the 305 or 21 there and could never ever picture the empty wasteland looking anything that resembles the busy city street in the picture.
http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...rren_1940s.jpg

[Mikeg]

Most of the rails were updated a couple years before the system stopped operating in the mid 50's. What suprises me is that what has not been mentioned is that in 1950 the city gave money for a tranportation study to GM! Guess what their answer was?

The DSR's streetcar system did not "stop operating in the mid-1950s", it was "stopped" through a steady, decade-long process of conversion to buses that began only after a twenty year trend of steady and/or declining ridership and a ten year trend of increased bus service. The downward streetcar ridership trend was broken only during the war period of 1942-45, during which the DSR's 2,000 buses shouldered much of the peak load demand, particularly since steel rails and switches were unavailable and all new war mfg. plants had to be serviced by bus. It's interesting to note that at least 500 of those buses were manufactured by the Ford Motor Co. - were they in on the conspiracy with GM, too? Also interesting is how GM must have "allowed" the DSR to buy more than 450 buses from Checker Cab in the 1950s.

The article that Russix linked to gives much of the story behind the impetus for converting the streetcar lines on the radial arteries. However, it fails to mention that it was based on some hard data, not just opinions and politics. In 1946, a vehicular traffic study was conducted by city of Detroit traffic engineers along Grand River near Quincy. They were experimenting with ways to increase peak traffic flow along Grand River between W. Grand Boulevard and Livernois. They found that by replacing the streetcars with curbside bus service and using reversable traffic lanes in the center of the roadway where the streetcars had been, they could increase rush hour traffic flow by 40%.

Here are the dates when streetcar service ended on selected routes:

Hamilton 4/28/47
Grand River 5/5/47
Crosstown 10/26/47
West Jefferson 7/18/48
Fort Street 6/23/49
Linwood 6/19/51
Mt. Elliot 6/19/51
Oakland 6/19/51
Clairmount 7/29/51
Mack 11/11/51
Chene 4/6/52
East Jefferson 2/7/54
Michigan 9/7/55
Gratiot 3/25/56
Woodward 4/8/56

As for the condition of any rails remaining under the pavement, it is clear that the DSR could not have done any rail replacement during the war years. Even as mismanaged as the DSR was, it's unlikely they would have sunk big bucks into a system-wide rail replacement once they started the streetcar line phase-outs after the war. Therefore, I highly doubt that "Most of the rails were updated a couple years before the system stopped operating" and it is more likely that any remaining rails are at least 70 years old.

[Detroitnerd]

In the federal judgment in the streetcar case, GM basically said, "We didn't do it, and we won't do it again."

[Fury13]

Moving toward buses was considered progress, so people in the '40s and '50s didn't kick too much about losing the streetcars. There was a perception that the streetcar was a 19th century mode of transit, that it was outdated.

That perception has pretty much reversed itself now. Rail is seen as progressive, efficient, and clean. In the minds of many, buses are grungy, rough-riding, and filled with undesirables. Also, people know that "real cities that work" rely on rail to help transport the middle class: NYC, Chicago, Philly, Boston, DC, etc.

[Mikeg]

In the federal judgment in the streetcar case, GM basically said, "We didn't do it, and we won't do it again."

And exactly how does your repeated refrain pertain to Detroit and the publicly-owned DSR?

I've not yet seen anyone make a convincing case that the so-called "Great American Streetcar Scandal" was the cause of the DSR's conversion of their streetcar routes over to buses. The local streetcar conspiracy mongers remind me of those silly "truthers" and "birthers".

Also, people know that "real cities that work" rely on rail to help transport the middle class: NYC, Chicago, Philly, Boston, DC, etc.

Really dense "cities that work" rely on rail to help transport their middle class to and from jobs and shopping in their thriving city center. Where is the evidence that government can create a "city that works" by simply building a light rail system in a city afflicted with scattered low density residential districts and a hollowed-out city center?

[casscorridor]

And exactly how does your repeated refrain pertain to Detroit and the publicly-owned DSR?

I've not yet seen anyone make a convincing case that the so-called "Great American Streetcar Scandal" was the cause of the DSR's conversion of their streetcar routes over to buses. The local streetcar conspiracy mongers remind me of those silly "truthers" and "birthers".

Really dense "cities that work" rely on rail to help transport their middle class to and from jobs and shopping in their thriving city center. Where is the evidence that government can create a "city that works" by simply building a light rail system in a city afflicted with scattered low density residential districts and a hollowed-out city center?

Well you are sensationalizing the state of Detroit's neighborhoods, as well its Downtown. Sure, Detroit's neighborhoods are less dense than Chicago, New York or Phillys, but can you really call them "low-density"? I say no. The density is much higher than so-called succesfull cities like Houston or Dallas or Phoenix. And these places have more transit, the problem is that those cities were built around the car, while central Detroit was not... it was built around pedestrians and street cars. The urban skelleton is in Detroit, but not Dallas. All we need to do is put meat on the bones, and to do this we need transit. Through transit, neighborhood density will intensify. You also sensationalize Downtown. I wouldnt exactly call 150+ bars and restaurants "hollowed out" or the 6,000+ residents a ghost town. Althought it's nothing like it used to, Downtown is still alive, still the center of our region, still the #1 office district, and still one of the most walkable and transit-friendly places in Michigan. So dont right it off so quickly. Midtown/Downtown is basically the only place developing in our region right now
... everything else has stalled while we have new restaurants and shops opening up almost every week. Tansit will only accelerate this trend!

[casscorridor]

And exactly how does your repeated refrain pertain to Detroit and the publicly-owned DSR?

I've not yet seen anyone make a convincing case that the so-called "Great American Streetcar Scandal" was the cause of the DSR's conversion of their streetcar routes over to buses. The local streetcar conspiracy mongers remind me of those silly "truthers" and "birthers".

Really dense "cities that work" rely on rail to help transport their middle class to and from jobs and shopping in their thriving city center. Where is the evidence that government can create a "city that works" by simply building a light rail system in a city afflicted with scattered low density residential districts and a hollowed-out city center?

Well you are sensationalizing the state of Detroit's neighborhoods, as well its Downtown. Sure, Detroit's neighborhoods are less dense than Chicago, New York or Phillys, but can you really call them "low-density"? I say no. The density is much higher than so-called succesfull cities like Houston or Dallas or Phoenix. And these places have more transit, the problem is that those cities were built around the car, while central Detroit was not... it was built around pedestrians and street cars. The urban skelleton is in Detroit, but not Dallas. All we need to do is put meat on the bones, and to do this we need transit. Through transit, neighborhood density will intensify. You also sensationalize Downtown. I wouldnt exactly call 150+ bars and restaurants "hollowed out" or the 6,000+ residents a ghost town. Althought it's nothing like it used to, Downtown is still alive, still the center of our region, still the #1 office district, and still one of the most walkable and transit-friendly places in Michigan. So dont right it off so quickly. Midtown/Downtown is basically the only place developing in our region right now
... everything else has stalled while we have new restaurants and shops opening up almost every week. Tansit will only accelerate this trend!

[Mikeg]

Well you are sensationalizing the state of Detroit's neighborhoods, as well its Downtown.

Perhaps you misunderstood me - let me explain with some visuals from another source, since your first instinct is to accuse me of sensationalism [[if anyone on this thread is guilty of sensationalism, it's those who continually try to blame outside forces for the DSR's decision to convert their streetcar lines into bus routes).

By "scattered low density residential districts" I am referring to the "Prairie" and "Much Abandonment" areas shown on this map that was in Bill McGraw's special series, "Driving Detroit". Portions of the "Mixed" areas are also low density since they contain "a significant presence of abandoned buildings" which are more evenly spread out.

Nor have I "written off" the city center when I refer to it as "hollowed out". You yourself stated that "it's nothing like it used to" be. A hallowed out trees still stands and with proper care can still remain productive for many years, but it's nothing like it once was.

My point remains that simply expecting a new fixed transit system to revitalize Detroit is unrealistic unless most of its other chronic problems are also addressed. When you say, "All we need to do is put meat on the bones, and to do this we need transit", you're forgetting that it's hard to build muscle mass when the patient has multiple chronic diseases along with a few amputated body parts.

[ziggyselbin]

Well you are sensationalizing the state of Detroit's neighborhoods, as well its Downtown. Sure, Detroit's neighborhoods are less dense than Chicago, New York or Phillys, but can you really call them "low-density"? I say no. The density is much higher than so-called succesfull cities like Houston or Dallas or Phoenix. And these places have more transit, the problem is that those cities were built around the car, while central Detroit was not... it was built around pedestrians and street cars. The urban skelleton is in Detroit, but not Dallas. All we need to do is put meat on the bones, and to do this we need transit. Through transit, neighborhood density will intensify. You also sensationalize Downtown. I wouldnt exactly call 150+ bars and restaurants "hollowed out" or the 6,000+ residents a ghost town. Althought it's nothing like it used to, Downtown is still alive, still the center of our region, still the #1 office district, and still one of the most walkable and transit-friendly places in Michigan. So dont right it off so quickly. Midtown/Downtown is basically the only place developing in our region right now
... everything else has stalled while we have new restaurants and shops opening up almost every week. Tansit will only accelerate this trend!

You are fucking high. Detroit has vast and I mean vast area's where one or two houses are left standing.This is not one or two neighborhoods but dozens and dozens; and houses vacant and boarded in every neighborhood.

Downtown Detroit is not the center of anything. We all wish it were but it aint. All any objective i.e no emotional attachment observer need do is drive around downtown after 5p to see that.


The question from mikeg is on point

[Russix]

I find it funny that these last two posts point to the result of not having a functional transit system as the reason not to build one.

[Mikeg]

I find it funny that these last two posts point to the result of not having a functional transit system as the reason not to build one.

Ummm, where did I ever say that that a new fixed transit system should not be built? I think it's a sign of intellectual laziness and dishonesty when you attempt to discredit someone's ideas by mischaracterizing them instead of responding with your own counter-arguments.

What I wrote is that I do not believe a new transit system in and of itself is capable of revitalizing Detroit. This city and region has many chronic problems and unless they are also being simultaneously addressed, a new transit system can't do it alone.

[Russix]

No you didn't directly. But you are making an elaborate case of how its effectiveness will be limited or nil. Which is ultimately a negating argument for the construction of a mass transit system. Which if you don't find your viewpoint to be reasoning along the lines of anti-transit, at least don't become hostile when others interpret it as so.

As far as your point: “My point remains that simply expecting a new fixed transit system to revitalize Detroit is unrealistic unless most of its other chronic problems are also addressed.�
I think its rather hard to cure a lung cancer patient if you first do not get them to stop smoking[[if that was the root cause of the disease). And yes Detroit[[and Metro Detroit) has a huge array of problems that all need to be addressed, but ultimately little result can be expected unless the one major problem that completely differentiates us from the rest of the large Metros in the US and the developed world is solved: Transit. I think they look at us as an example of why to build transit.

[ziggyselbin]

No you didn't directly. But you are making an elaborate case of how its effectiveness will be limited or nil. Which is ultimately a negating argument for the construction of a mass transit system. Which if you don't find your viewpoint to be reasoning along the lines of anti-transit, at least don't become hostile when others interpret it as so.

As far as your point: “My point remains that simply expecting a new fixed transit system to revitalize Detroit is unrealistic unless most of its other chronic problems are also addressed.�
I think its rather hard to cure a lung cancer patient if you first do not get them to stop smoking[[if that was the root cause of the disease). And yes Detroit[[and Metro Detroit) has a huge array of problems that all need to be addressed, but ultimately little result can be expected unless the one major problem that completely differentiates us from the rest of the large Metros in the US and the developed world is solved: Transit. I think they look at us as an example of why to build transit.

It is a pipe dream to think that transit is going to cure much in detroit. Crime, schools, and many other things have to be dealt with.

[Whitehouse]

Shame that this has vanished forever....

[Whitehouse]

Quite telling that there's a Dutch[[!!) wikipadia page about the [url=[B]http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Department_of_Street_Railways]Detroit Department of Street Railways[/url[/B]]. My city lost the streetcar system also way longer ago than anyone can remember, and truthfully, that city was way to small to support an system like that. Distances are walkable in the city center. There are some pictures of the last PCC cars.


Michiganline

Streetcar on Woodward.


The colourscheme.

Not that it helps in any case but the Detroit streetcars suffered a bit better fate than Minneapolis streetcars....


The Detroit cars soldiered on a bit longer in Mexico City.

[Whitehouse]

Great link about the Detroit Streetcars and the fate they had.
http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...roitPCC-5.html

[Whitehouse]

I made a"Before and after" picture with Google Streetview.


Before....



...and after.
Returning even one example of the Detroit streetcars is almost impossible. During the 1985 earthquake almost all of the ex-Detroit streetcars were crushed....