The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, May 10, 1917, Page 5

Ban Francisco’s new City Hall, at Civic Center, supplanting ruins shown on op- posite page. A} were held up six months by another attack in the court, but in July, 1910, the city sold the first of the bonds and the next year commenced work on the Geary street publicly owned line. This line was completed in 1912 and start- ed operation with 10 cars from Xear- ney street to the ocean. The people at last, after a 10-year fight, had a street car line of their own. It did not, however, tap the chief source of the short haul pas- sengers, where the big money was. The downtown end of the line did not reach the Ferry terminals, daily pour- ing their hundreds of thousands of people in and out of San Francisco and turn)‘shing the most profitable street car business in the city. The United Railroads thought they had the Ferry business sewed up tight, for they owned and operated two lines of track on lower Market street and con- trolled another private company that operated two more lines on the same 8treet, making four tracks in the mid- dle of this broad thoroughfare of the City from Geary street to the ferries. Market street was the only artery leading to the Ferry terminal, except by roundabout routes. The city could lay no more tracks on lower Market because the four existing tracks were all the street could stand and admit other traffic. CITY FIGHTS FOR RIGHT TO USE ITS OWN STREET The city began a long and strenu- ous fight for the joint use of one of the Bets of track on its own street lead- ing from Geary down Market. to the ferries. ~The details of this fight Bgainst the private corporations blocking the way and the united for- ces of the city opposing municipal ownership would be tedious. It suf- fices to say that a court decision a Year later gave {.he city the right to use the outside two tracks of the four on lower Market street, and in June, 1913, the city began the operation of cars from the ferries to the ocean, through the center of the business-dis- trict and in a straight line out Geary through thickly populated districts. The people’s line was now a real line, and 18 more cars were added to the 10 originally put in operation. An en- tering wedge had been driven into the private monopoly of the San Fran- cisco street car business, which wedge is now fast driving the United Rail- roads from the field, and by 1929, when the bulk of the franchises of the pri- wvate corporation expires, the people of the city will be conducting practically all their own car lines and operating them for service to the public, not for profit. For the success of the Geary street municipal line and others sub- sequently put in operation has deter- mined the city to continue its policy Fountain at San Franciscol Civic Cens ter, with City Hall in background. of taking over the various lines now .Privately operated, as the franchises expire. EARNINGS PAY INTEREST, ON BONDS AND THEN SOME At the present time the people of San Francisco operate 45 miles of street car track and the United Rail- roads 245 miles. The publicly owned system has been financed by using the credit of the city taxpayers to issue bonds, but the railroad itself is retiring all the bonds as they come due, meeting all the interest and pay- ing all the operating expenses out of the revenues of the city lines, and be- sides is making big profits. The sur- Dlus revenues are laid aside to cover depreciation and extend new lines. Extensions from now on will practic- ally all be made from the profits of ex- isting lines. The people loaned their credit to start the lines, but the people have not been taxed a cent yet and probably never will be on account of the municipal street railway. The city lines made a net profit of over $2,000 the first year, which in- creased to $540,000 in 1914, which in- creased to over $1,000,000 the year of the exposition and which totaled $434,- 787 last year. Last year the publicly owned system carried 47,886,784 pas- sengers and had a gross revenue of about $2,000,000. The people own 200 big, modern, “California type” street cars. The city operates bigger and better cars and maintains better serv- ice than: the United Railroads and has no difficulty at all competing points in getting most of the business. The California street muni- cipal line formerly operated by a pri- vate corporation and considered a los- ing proposition, is making money un- der city management. When I was crossing over from Oakland to San Francisco by ferry and asked direc- tions to the hotel I was going to, a fellow passenger, who lived in San Francisco, advised me to take the municipal line, as it was quicker and operated more cars, which were hence less crowded than the privately own- ed line, i San Francisco’s success with the best municipally owned line in the United States has not come, against the opposition encountered, except with a united people back of the pro- Ject. I asked a San Franciscan why the people supported the city railroad 50 loyally. SAN FRANCISCO IS LOYAL TO ITS OWN ENTERPRISE ‘“Because it is a San Francisco in- stitution and their own,” he said. “It is something to be proud of and some- thing that we are leading the United States in. They support it because it is & success, but they would support it anyway. If somebody proposed a sys- tem of municipally operated peaunt stands in San Francisco and the city went in for it, whether wisely or not, the people of San Francisco would support those city peanut stands to the last ditch and make it the best system of peanut stands operated in . the country. All the ridicule and oppo- sition you could scare up against those municipally owned . peanut stands would only make the people the more ‘determined to make them successful.” I don’t think the people of San Fran- cisco are going in for municipal peanut stands, but the ‘story illustrates the loyalty of the people for their muni- cipally owned undertakings, and it is this spirit that has made them a suc- cess. Another big factor in the suc- cessful outcome of the street car un- dertaking is the determination to keep politics out of the municipal street car system and to hire experts to handle it and pay them as much or more than a' private corporation would pay them, All employes are under civil service :and owe loyalty or support to no poli- tcian for their jobs, M, M. O'Shaugh- nessy, city enginger, executive officer of the board of public works and build- er of the city lines, gets $15,000 a year, He was a successful consulting engl- neer whose services were in demand throughout the West when the city hired him and gave him the free hand he demanded in the building of the lines. A politician would as soon put his neck in a noose as to tackle O'Shaughnessy on any political in- trigue regarding the building and operating of the city lines. Thomas A. Cashin is superintendent of the muni- cipal railway actively in charge of op- eration. He gets a fat salary and earns it. He was superintendent of the privately operated line at Fresno, Cal., when the city called him to take charge of the 10 cars originally put in opera- tion on Geary street. CITY LINE GIVES MORE PAY AND SHORT HOURS The city pays $3 a day as a minimum wage for all employes and the eight- hour day prevails. The United Rail- roads work their men 10 hours and start them at $2.50 with the chance of getting as much as $3 only after long service. ‘The city shares with its workers the profits of the city lines by the better hours and better pay. One of the most important court de- cisions affecting municipal ownership in the United States has just been rendered in connection with the pub- licly owned street car system of San Francisco by the federal court. This decision holds that the people have the right to build street car tracks on their own streets whenever and wherever they want to regardless of franchises over the same street held by private corporations. Thid seems like a simple proposition. .One ought, it would seem, . to be able to do as he pleases when it comes to putting improvements on his own land. San Francisco has just gone through a long legal battle to get the right to use its own ‘streets as it pleases. When the city built its Church street car line- it wanted an outlet down upper Market street, just like it wanted an outlet down lower Market street for .months of fighting for the city to get those seven blocks of right of way and it cost $200,000. There is a lot of difference between operating a street railway for profit and for service. When it is operated for service by the municipality things can be done like the present plan of the publicly owned system to run auto busses into remote and unserved dis- tricts, even though no profit can be made by such bus lines. San Francisco is planning on running busses into many districts that need transporta- tion facilities to connect them with the ends of present car lines, in instances where it would not pay to extend the tracks. Another instance is the sys- tem of busses to be operated by the city system around the water front. -The state operates a freight railroad around the bay, to connect all the publicly owned wharves, warehouses, etc, but maintains no passenger serv- ice. No private corporation would give the passenger service, although it was sorely needed. There would be no profit in it. The city, however, has worked out a plan for busses that will pay their own way, even if they make no profit, and thousands of people will be given service hitherto denied them. The object of the city is to transport people, not to make money. TUNNEL THROUGH MOUNTAIN TO GIVE BETTER SERVICE San Francisco is now digging a $4,000,000 tunnel through Twin Peaks, the famous mountain that stands at the head of Market street and cuts off the western part of the city from the east- ern. And it will be a municipally own- ed and operated street car line that will ply through® this tunnel and open a short cut for thousands of people who now have to go miles around. I met Mr. O'Shaughnessy in his of- fice in the new city hall, built on the . new.civic center which is designed to be the most beautiful and imposing in the country. I asked him about poli- tics. ) Municipal auditorium, another building at San Francisco's Civic Center. the Geary line. But upper Market did “not have four lines of track controlled by franchises by a private company. It had only two, and so there was room for the city to put in its tracks out- side those of the United Railroads, which occupied the middle of the street. The city started to lay its tracks and was enjoined. It was contended the city could not parallel the tracks of a private company to which the city in the old days had given a fran- chise. It is this contention that the court has recently thrown out, giving the people the right to build their own tracks on their own street. The city will proceed with laying its tracks at once, giving an outlet downtown and to the ferries for the Church street municipal line, MEET OPPOSITION OF BIG PROPERTY OWNERS This same Church street line fur- nished an example of another kind of opposition to municipal ownership that its enemies can scare up when need be, The city needed seven blocks of right of way of the street to get around a hill in the Church street district, .. The corporations and others opposed to municipal ownership egged on the owners of this land to hold out for fabulous prices, and stirred up the people who originally asked the city to extend the system down Church street to oppose the project. It took 18 -to San Francisco. Municipal ownership - advocates used to boint to the Glasgow, Scotland, city rail- ways to argue their success. Now they point The West can show the way to the East whenever it is ready to make the effort. “You know,” I said, “they say the people can not operate their own utili- ties because politics will enter in.” I felt kind of guilty springing this old argument with whiskers on it in the presence of the only $15,000 city engineer in the United States. But I wanted to get his answer. WHEN CITY LINE CAME IN POLITICS WENT OUT “Politics!"” he said. “Why, San Fran- cisco went into municipal ownership to get politics OUT of the street car lines. The various corporations that furnished us street car service were always in pelitics, pulling and hauling and bribing and what not to get fran- chises and other concessions. We had to put some of the Politicians they bought up in the penitentiary for ag- cepting bribes. Our street car graft prosecution were a spectacle for the world. Why, the street car business here, under private control solely, was nothing but politics, ©of the dirtiest, most corrupt kind. We have taken the street car lines out of politics. Civil service assures only competent em- ployes and prevents them owing allegiance to politicians. Hiring the best experts we can get, making them responsible and giving ‘them a free hand assures competent management free from politics. Municipal owner- ship has banished politics in the oper- (Continued on page 16) o ooy == Sl ek S e Ak Sl 2op o AR o A e R g 7