Technological Momentum, Motor Buses, and the Persistence of Canada's Street Railways to 1940 DONALD DAVIS Résumé Abstract À une date aussi récente que 1939, 80 p. 100 As recently as 1939, 80 per cent of transit pas­ des voyageurs dans les villes canadiennes em­ sengers in Canada's cities still travelled on pruntaient des tramways et cela, malgré l'ap­ street railways, and this despite the introduc­ parition des autobus comme concurrents, dès tion of motor buses as competition as early as 1915. Cet article étudie les moyens par lesquels 1915. This article examines the ways in which les tramways électriques canadiens ont résisté Canadian electric railways contained the chal­ à la concurrence des autobus. L'auteur sou­ lenge from the motor bus. It posits the view tient qu'un facteur majeur de la survie des that a major factor in the survival of street rail­ tramways est l'habileté que démontrait leur ways was their owner's success in gaining propriétaire à obtenir le contrôle du développe­ control over motor bus development, then sub­ ment des autobus, puis à utiliser par la suite ces sequently using the bus to extend the life of the derniers pour allonger la vie des réseaux ferrés. rail systems. After World War II, the high cost Après la Seconde Guerre mondiale, le coût of renewing tracks and declining patronage élevé du renouvellement des voies et la baisse favoured investment in trolly coaches and/or du nombre des clients ont favorisé l'investisse­ motor buses rather than in the modernization ment dans les trolleybus ou les autobus plutôt of the street railway systems. Service was still que dans la modernisation des réseaux de provided, however, by large vehicles operating tramways. Cependant, de grands véhicules des­ on inflexible routes. This conservative approach servant des routes immuables assuraient encore to transportation on the part of the city traction du service. Cette approche conservatrice du monopolies ultimately ensured the triumph of transport de la part des monopoles urbains the private automobile as the dominant carrier de la traction a assuré en fin de compte le of urban commuters. triomphe de l'automobile privée en tant que moyen de transport dominant des banlieusards. As recently as 1939, 80 per cent of transit pas­ 1950s, its use of interurban routes to cross- sengers in Canada's cities still travelled on subsidize city service and, more generally, street railways, an entire generation after the the superiority of its management. Oriented appearance of the first significant motor bus towards explaining Toronto's uniqueness, this competition in 1915.1 Compared to the almost research cannot explain, except by inference, immediate disappearance of the horsecar after the persistence of trams elsewhere in Canada.2 electric traction began competing with it in As a first step towards a more general expla­ the 1890s, the persistence of street railways in nation of the tram's survival into the 1940s, this the larger Canadian cities into and beyond article examines the ways in which Canadian World War II requires some explanation. How­ electric railways contained the challenge from ever, only for Toronto - the lone Canadian city the motor bus. It does not offer a complete where trams survived into the 1960s - has one answer to the question of the electric railway's been offered. It has focussed on what made persistence; rather it focusses on the role that the Toronto system distinctive: its compact­ "technological momentum" plays in the per­ ness, its high ridership, its avoidance of sistence of an old technology, which street rail­ unprofitable suburban routes until the mid ways were in 1915. Its thesis is simple: that a Material History Review 36 (Fall 1992) I Revue d'histoire de la culture matérielle 36 (automne 1992) 6 major factor in the survival of Canada's street systematization had thoroughly infused North railways after 1915 was their success in gain­ American culture with its values and priorities, ing control over motor bus development and of which the most important for mass transit their subsequent use of the bus to extend the was its emphasis on efficiency as the appro­ life of the rail system. priate test for new technologies.4 The ability of the practitioners of conven­ tional technology to determine what tests a Technological Momentum new, alternative technology must pass to qual­ As the concept of technological momentum ify for societal adoption is also, as Hugh Aitken provides the intellectual framework for this has observed for radio, an important source piece, it merits brief discussion before pro­ of technological momentum. New systems ceeding to the analysis of street railway per­ are often "judged to be less efficient than the sistence and motor bus development before system" they challenge because they are less World War II. The concept derives from the developed, still incomplete, and because the work of Thomas P. Hughes on the electrification "standards of performance by which the new of Western society. He concluded that large system is appraised have been worked out in technological systems "have a characteristic terms of the jobs that the old system has done analogous to the inertia of motion in the phys­ and the criteria especially relevant to those ical world." They derive this conservative jobs." As Edward Constant has pointed out, momentum, or power of trajectory, from - to use since alternative technologies tend to "... John Staudenmeier's terminology - the "main­ exhibit their greatest virtues along different tenance constituency" created by the system dimensions - efficiency versus speed, for exam­ itself as it matures, becoming "embedded in ple," the power of old technologies to dictate the social fabric." This constituency consists, performance criteria for new ones is a funda­ Staudenmeier says, of, mental inertial force in any society.5 all the individuals, groups, and institutions that have come to depend on the design [ofthe tech­ nology] and consequently have adapted to its The Onset of Buses constraints. Because they both profit from and With these basic notions in mind, let us exam­ depend upon it they maintain its momentum ine the process by which the technological in society and become a primary source of its momentum of Canada's street railways empow­ power to affect future technological and soci­ ered them to shape motor bus technology to aid etal directions. their own survival. The analysis begins in The sources of system persistence include, 1914-15 with the onset of significant bus com­ then, not merely the "vested interests, fixed petition. The bus, then commonly known as a assets, and sunk costs" of concern primarily to jitney (a sobriquet derived from west coast managers ofthe system, but also the adaptations American slang for a five-cent coin), did not made by those served by the system and by generally have the operating characteristics those, like municipal governments, who have later seen as central to motor bus technology. based their fiscal and regulatory regimes on a First, the jitney was considerably smaller than presumption of system durability.3 subsequent transit buses; it was typically a Self-interest generates momentum. Also Ford Model T touring car modified to handle important, however, are the cultural adapta­ between five and twelve passengers. Second, tions, the changes in mentality induced by the it generally operated as a hailed-ride, route system. The most important of these, so far as taxi; in other words, it had neither a set sched­ street railways were concerned, was the value ule nor fixed stops. About 3800 motor vehicles North Americans had come to place on the with these characteristics operated as jitneys idea ofthe system itself. The "search for order" in Canada during the summer of 1915; that after 1870 had led, as Joel Tarr and others have was one out of every 25 motor vehicles in the 6 remarked, to rejection by urban elites of the country. "messy decentralized and labor-intensive tech­ The popularity of the new technology var­ nologies of die preindustrial city" in favour of ied considerably from one community to the the order and control offered by centralized, next, but it generally fared best in Vancouver, hierarchical, capital-intensive systems. By the Victoria, Hamilton, London and Toronto, cities time the motor bus challenged electric trac­ with a relatively mild climate (jitneys were tion, the economic benefits associated with normally open vehicles), paved roads and an 7 0r PH FlppKcvtp "> »L" »r PBLKL Connusone/>s. unpopular tram system. The number of jitneys Table 1: Jitneys, maximum number reported by Fig.l also fluctuated with local employment condi­ Canadian city, 1915 Although most jitneys tions because the owner-operators typically were owner-operated, came from businesses - the skilled trades or real No. of Cities there were abortive estate sales - that were more lucrative than jitneys attempts to organize bus-driving in boom times. The western depres­ jitney corporations. sion after 1913 thus helps to explain the high 1-25 Belleville Berlin Calgary Promoters of one such incidence of jitneys in frigid Winnipeg and Esquimau Fort William Halifax venture in Toronto offered this blueprint to Edmonton (see Table 1 for the breakdown by London Montreal New Westminster 7 Oakville Oshawa Ottawa show that 12-16 people city). could fit onto a Model T Owen Sound Quebec Regina Wherever hard times spurred a hundred or Ford chassis. (City oj Saint John Saskatoon Sherbrooke more motorists to swarm into the trade, the jit­ Toronto Archives) ney bus became a dangerous competitor for it Sudbury Thorold Vernon could then compete with the street railway in 75-100 Edmonton frequency of service, at least on the principal 120-150 Victoria thoroughfares, while operating at speeds 40 to 50 per cent faster than the 8.5 to 10.5 miles (14 650-700 Hamilton Vancouver to 17 kilometres) per hour achieved by most > 800 Toronto Winnipeg urban railways of the era.