Laredo Weekly Times

TRANSPORTATION.

Brownsville has lost its single street car. The city power company has cut off the power because the street car company hasn't paid its bill for current, and now the people will have to depend on motor busses or other means of transportation. Which merely goes to prove that everything today is against the street car, despite the fact that it has been, is now and will be (until some more efficient transportation medium is devised) the best means of transportation for busy people who have no time to waste when they go to work or return home after a busy day.

The street car is coming back into its own in the larger cities mainly because of the congestion caused by a surplus of automobiles. For some time it was believed that the transportation problem had been solved to everybody's satisfaction by the simple expedient of everyone owning his car.

But when the cars began to clutter up the streets, blocking all the public highways and using the thoroughfares for storage purposes, while the necessary traffic regulations began to slow down the speed rate, there was a change of opinion and many left their cars at home and sought other vehicles to get to work.

Then came the restrictions on parking, causing people whose work was in the business district and who had been in the habit of leaving their cars where most convenient to their offices, to park at points some distance away and proceed to their places of business on foot, or even in the street cars, and there was less reason than ever for the average man to come to work in his own auto.

Finally, the people of limited incomes, who had bought a car in the mistaken notion that it was a great help in getting to work early, discovered that the only use they had for a car was for driving about evenings and Sundays, and they returned to the street car-the people's conveyance-in order to be sure of getting to work in the morning and getting back home before a late hour at night.

The street car does not suffer from a flat tire, from a leaky radiator, from an unexpected shortage of gas, or any of the other troubles that afflict the motorist, especially the one who is his own chauffeur. It occasionally stops for a few minutes, but that is rare.

The increasing number of professional and business men who began to use the street car in the big cities necessitated more rolling stock and reduced time schedules. This was an increased advantage to the working classes who get down town an hour or so before the rush, and it has resulted in increased revenue for the street car companies.

In the smaller cities conditions began to reflect those of the metropolis, and while there were more jitneys in the small towns than in the large, in proportion to the patrons of the street cars, the old reliable traction conveyance seemed to be coming back into its own everywhere while some of the street car systems have augmented their business by running out and maintaining motor bus routes as feeders to the main lines where the distance was too great for the patrons to walk to the car line, and the cost of building new tracks was not justified by the amount of patronage.

There are more people riding the street cars in Laredo today than ever before, despite the great number of private autos and public cars for hire. And this has meant improved service, for the company naturally is able to spend more money from its increased revenue.

So far there has been no danger of the street cars being done away with, and this is from an increased service to the public. The same firm has reported from Laredo in view of our narrow streets.