Comments

1
They took them out because people would rather drive cars. But I agree that it is stupid that we're trying to replace them at huge expense.
2
A) The old tracks weren't torn up, they were paved over for the most part. I saw brick-lined tracks uncovered on 6th Ave when they re-did the transit mall, and more recently on the Broadway Bridge.

B) The GM thing is a myth. A whole lot of factors converged that led to the demise of trolleys nationwide (cheap gas, cheap land in the suburbs, new freeways, 50-year old infrastructure that had not been maintained properly, to name a few), but it's easier to just say "GM did it! I saw it in Roger Rabbit!" Here is a fascinating and accurate history of what actually happened in Portland.
http://www.cafeunknown.com/2006/10/off-lin…
3
Also interesting to note: How much fuller Ross Island is prior to being excavated.
4
Those streetcars and the urban growth boundary have been what makes Portland what it is today. Before zoning, apartments and storefronts were built along those routes. That is where the great walkable mixed use neighborhoods are today. Other cities tore those neighborhoods down or abandoned them for suburbs.
5
@1: You've got the causation backwards. People abandoned public transportation and embraced cars as the predominant mode of transport in this country only when the automobile industry bought up the streetcar systems across the nation and dismantled them to increase sales for their vehicles. In a calculated maneuver, GM formed subsidiaries to buy up these systems, convert them to buses, and in the process made them transport unreliable and unworkable. This, combined with suburban zoning and the interstate highway system, is what led people to embrace car-dominated transportation in this country. It wasn't by popular demand, it was pushed on people. Not much pushing was needed, of course, because it looked like progress at the time.
6
It was a mix of both. Streetcars became increasingly impractical as more and more cars clogged the streets. This is why we saw a continued decline in all forms of transit that don't have dedicated right-of-way. Why sit in a bus in traffic when you can sit in your car?

Is it surprising that cars took over after the government built brand new highways for everyone to drive on? The government fronted billions of dollars to build this infrastructure, while simultaneously taxing the railroads.

Blabby,

How much do the interstate highways pay in property taxes each year? Nothing. How much does Union Pacific pay in property taxes for the railroad routes they own? A lot.
7
yous guys telling me you'd rather been riding round on some street car than cruising in your own Merc Coup or something? man, what a bunch of sissies.
8
Ahh, re-visiting transportation history again.
I would bet even geyser, at that time and era, would have been looking forword to his first car and getting off the streetcar.
People wanted cars, and they got them.
9
The next season of Grimm should reveal that several trolley lines still run, in underground tunnels beneath major thoroughfares, with the downtown terminal being hidden somewhere beneath the Standard Insurance Building.
10
Frankie,

Our current transportation system has been built on decades and decades of cheap energy, and the assumption that energy will continue to be cheap. This will not be the case in the future. Your generation will cling to your cars like the people that fought the removal of the streetcars. I'll be glad when you and the others like you are gone.
11
Chris, why the venom?
Hey, I bike to and from work - leaving my rather old, gas frugal Honda in the garage.
The only point I was trying to make is that it is pointless to question the motivations of peoples changing commuting habits 60-70 years ago, and also unfair and lazy to lay the blame at Government, Big Oil, etc.
Yes, energy prices will continue to climb - at a rate likely higher than inflation. We also don't know what the cars of the future will be powered on either.
12
@FRANKIEB: I HOPE THE CARS OF THE FUTURE ARE POWERED BY SNARKY INTERNET COMMENTS, BECAUSE THEN I WILL BE A ONE MAN OPEC.
13
GRAHAM FOR A PAINFULLY ACCURATE COTW.
14
How did GM get rid of the trolley system, IN EVERY OTHER COUNTRY IN THE WORLD?
15
They didn't. What do you want, an international history of public transit in the 20th century in a Mercury comment thread?

And I'm not going to rebut Frankieb's ignorant comments about what I would have done in another era, or the history I mentioned (which is one of the most uncontroversial and well-documented business conspiracies of its era in US history) or whether it's okay to blame the government or Big Oil... for what I don't know. More of frankieb's vague and uninformed comments. And no venom here, just a little anger about a set issues that happens to be vastly important.
16
Why do progressives advocate regressive solutions to solve perceived future problems?
17
I don't want an explanation. It just seems to me that it's hard to argue GM or big oil or whoever people blame for running trolley's off of US soil when the same thing happened everywhere. It was an inevitability once cars reached a certain level of utility.
18
The same thing didn't happen everywhere. There are trams in many countries in continental Europe that never went away, for example. And just because streetcars went away in the US and, say, the UK doesn't mean it went down the same way in both places. A decent intro to what I'm talking about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motor…
There was also a good documentary on this called "Taken for a Ride."
19
@chris...wishing death on someone is not very nice. I am just glad Alex posted an article and didn't have everyone on her ass about small irrelevant mistakes! Yay!
20
Am I the only one who noticed all the "motor coach" routes on the map?

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