White flight=sharply declinging population=declining ridership=inability to maintain=shutting down the lines

I highly suggest reading Streets & Streetcars of St. Louis as it clarifies in great detail each of the streetcar lines that once operated in St. Louis.

Also, Joe Frank did an excellent job looking at a number of them which 60 years ago yesterday switched to buses. http://joefrank.blogspot.com/2006/06/en ... nd-of.html



White flight and decreased ridership are only partially true and then only at a certain point in time. Streetcar lines began switching to bus service as early as the 1930s. Many switched to bus in the 1940s and by the mid-late 1950s all but a few lines were over to bus. Just over half the original lines remained after 1948. The late 40's closures were actually planned for the early 40s but were delayed due to WWII.



Thus, most streetcars had become bus routes before landmark civil rights cases of the 1950s and civil rights legislation of the 1960s that created lots of white flight in the 1960s-present.



Some lines further out were consolidated into other routes (both via rail & bus) most likely due to decreased ridership as the car became more popular.



Several real factors played into the demise of the streetcars. Reasons cited in the intro to the book include:

? St. Louis County wanted the streetcars gone in the late 40s so they could do street widening projects to keep up with a growing number of cars.

? Television began entertaining folks so evening ridership decreased begining in the late 40s.

??As demand fell, so did service, resulting in fewer riders. This occcured for streetcars as well as bus lines.

??Downtown parking lots and private cars reduced public transit use to downtown. Downtown also lost business to new suburban shopping areas not served by transit.

??Many remaining streetcar lines were victims of road widening, interstate highway construction or bridge replacement projects.

? Private streetcar companies were required to pay taxes on fixed street railway infrastructure. Buses eliminated such taxes on the companies.

??Streetcars were phased out because their rail and electric lines required maintenance and conflicted with road projects.

? Many streetcars also were old vehicles and did not have air conditioning.

? The public noted the new buses held more seats than the older streetcars and had a smoother ride.



The book notes a daily peak turnout of 1471 buses in 1953 compared to only 400 in 2001. The removal of streetcars is less about rail and more about many other factors.



I also recommend the book Cash, Tokens, and Transfers: A History of Urban Mass Transit in North America.



We also have the often disputed claim that GM & others help speed up the process by conspiring to sell GM buses, Standard Oil and Firestone tires. This is addressed in the Cash, Tokens & Transfers book as part urban myth part fact.



There was no escaping the fact that in the 1950s GM was a powerhouse and they were in the business of building buses, not rail vehicles. Had they bought out a company that built rail vehicles rather than buses things might be very different today.

A few more tidbits from Cash, Tokens & Transfers:

In 1948 the latter (new PCC streetcar) was in the $40,000 range, while a 50-passenger bus cost about $16,000. One can narrow this differential by virtue of the fact that a new 1950 streetcar had a marginally larger carrying capacity than a bus, plus the fact that the $40,000 streetcar had a useful service life of at least twice that of the bus. But performing all the necessary calculations still leads to the conclusion that a bus was a cheaper vehicle to buy than a streetcar --- annualized, on a per seat basis, however, one cares to express it.

The author goes on to talk about even if it could be rationalized to be even the companies operating the streetcars didn't want to take on as much debt.



The Saint Louis Car Company was one of the major buliders of the streamlined PCC streetcars of the 1930s-50s. So the end of the streetcar hurt the local economy as they did not seem to switch to manufacturing buses.



Regions that had subway & other non-street rail systems continued to offer mass transit. NYC, Boston & Philly all had systems in place. Some cities like New Orleans and Toronto continued with their streetcar systems. Toronto supplemented the streetcar with subway & light rail in later years while keeping streetcar service.