Category: Policies

From the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

The link is here

TRANSPORTATION has been of vital importance to Cleveland–a principal factor that explains why the city grew into a major metropolis. Initially, that meant Cleveland’s access to water; a town site along the mouth of the CUYAHOGA RIVER made real sense. Much of the community’s early history involved LAKE TRANSPORTATION, with scores of sailing schooners, brigs, and barks that transported intercity cargos. Eventually, steam-powered vessels appeared, and quickly took over much of the carrying trade. The first steamboat on the Great Lakes, the 330-ton WALK-IN-THE-WATER, made its maiden voyage in 1818; by 1840 more than 60 steamboats served the lakes, and many called at Cleveland’s docks. These vessels were faster, and in most cases could carry bigger payloads, than their wind-driven counterparts. The value of the Great Lakes to Cleveland also increased because of internal improvements to these waterways–lighthouses, deeper harbors and channels and the like–made them more useful to shipping interests. The opening of the Welland Canal between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie in Nov. 1829 enhanced the overall value of the Great Lakes to Cleveland, and construction in the 1850s of the Sault Canal around the falls of the St. Mary’s River at the foot of Lake Superior had an even more pronounced effect. Most of all, the city’s iron and steel industry blossomed. The basic components of these metals–iron ore and limestone–could be transported to sites along the Cuyahoga River by an inexpensive all-water route from the Lake Superior country.

While heavy cargoes dominated Lake Erie commerce, especially after the Civil War, boats also carried people. Daily passenger service between Buffalo and Detroit via Cleveland began in 1830, and the “Forest City” became home port to several of the leading Great Lakes passenger carriers. As late as the first quarter of the 20th century, the Detroit & Cleveland Navigation Co. and the CLEVELAND & BUFFALO TRANSIT CO. boomed the merits of pleasure and overnight business trips by water: “Spacious stateroom and parlors combined with the quietness with which the boats are operated ensures refreshing sleep.” But by World War II, the automobile and airplane–the same transportation forms that would greatly reduce intercity rail passenger travel–virtually killed lake passenger service, and the piers at the foot of E. 9th St. became quiet. Modernization also affected freight-carrying vessels on the lake. Great “fresh-water whales”–the long bulk carriers–appeared early in the century and continued the tradition of transporting raw materials to Cleveland plants. By the 1960s these distinctive boats shared water space with oceangoing ships. Completion of the artificial channels and locks of the St. Lawrence Seaway project in 1959 made the latter’s entry possible, and thus Cleveland became an ocean port. The mariner’s map of the world had been altered significantly.

While an evolutionary process was at work on the Great Lakes, Cleveland’s other important water route, the OHIO AND ERIE CANAL, eventually stopped being a transportation artery, but not for several generations after its opening. Even though Cleveland’s population in 1820 totaled only 606, it could still rightfully claim to be a premier lake port. Therefore, state officials wisely selected the community during the early 1820s to be the northern terminus of the projected 308-mi. canal. When completed in 1832, the “Great Ditch” linked Lake Erie at Cleveland with the Ohio River near Portsmouth. A usage pattern somewhat resembling the one seen for lake commerce characterized the Ohio Canal. At first both “hogs and humans” traveled this waterway; the latter boarded specially fitted packets. Admittedly, it was smoother than the ride provided by the various stagecoach lines, but canal travel was extremely slow and unavailable during cold weather or occasional flooding. This means of transportation reached its zenith in the 1840s but declined dramatically with the advent of railroads. Freight, which included wheat, flour, whiskey, pork, salt, limestone, and coal, continued to move by canal long after packets disappeared. Even as late as 1900, the low rates charged by boat owners still attracted bulk cargoes, mostly coal, from east-central Ohio into the ClevelandFLATS. But eventually railroads, in particular the Cleveland Terminal & Valley, conquered the venerable Ohio Canal.

Steam RAILROADS revolutionized Cleveland transportation. By the outbreak of the Civil War, only a dozen years after the arrival of the first steam locomotive, this means of intercity transport was firmly established. The vast majority of people selected railroads for personal travel and to meet their shipping needs. All recognized that water competitors were slow and were universally susceptible to the vagaries of the weather, especially thick winter ice. Furthermore, the railroad offered convenience; businesses tended to choose a railroad rather than a water location. By the post-Civil War era, the flanged wheel had become virtually synonymous with transportation. Yet the Railway Age did not last forever. The first major challenge to the dominance of steam trains came with the introduction of the electric INTERURBANS. Clevelanders in 1895 could brag that they had one of the country’s first intercity traction lines, the Akron, Bedford & Cleveland Railroad. Within a decade, residents had the services of a half-dozen interurban systems that radiated out of the city to the east, south, and west. Interurbans, with their frequent runs, attractive rates, and noticeable cleanliness, siphoned off tens of thousands of potential steam railroad patrons, and captured much of the highly profitable package express and less-than-carload freight business. At times the Cleveland-area steam roads slashed charges or increased trips, but usually they let the interurbans have much of the traffic.

Just as steam railroads showed their vulnerability to interurbans, the latter proved to be even more susceptible to competition. Gasoline-powered vehicles speedily replaced those propelled by electricity. After the dawn of the 20th century, Cleveland emerged as a major center of the AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY, and per capita ownership of the horseless carriage soared. In 1916, for example, Cuyahoga County’s automobile registrations totaled 61,000; 10 years later the figure stood at 211,000. Cleveland’s long-standing ties to the automobile are represented nicely in the career of resident Frank B. Stearns (1878-1955). In 1898 Stearns launched a manufacturing concern, the F. B. STEARNS CO., to build automobiles of his own design and established himself as an important American automobile maker. He also participated in several road races to demonstrate the remarkable potential of this new method of transport. In Jan. 1900 he helped found the Cleveland Automobile Club, the nucleus of the powerful and influential American Automobile Assn. (see OHIO MOTORISTS ASSN.). Services offered by the Cleveland Automobile Club helped expand automobile usage in the area by the 1930s.

Better roads stimulated automobile sales after World War I, and they also did much to encourage expansion of bus and trucking operations. Cleveland’s early intercity bus companies operated relatively short routes; in fact, their system maps closely resembled interurban maps. In 1925, for example, travelers could board vehicles of the Cleveland-Ashtabula-Conneaut Bus Co. on PUBLIC SQUARE for travel to these communities and numerous intermediate points; they might select a run of the Cleveland-Akron-Canton Bus Co., a carrier that followed much of the route of the Northern Ohio Traction & Light Co., or they could opt for buses of the Cleveland-Warren-Youngstown Stage Co., among others. In the 1930s these smaller firms gave way to larger ones. The Cleveland-based Buckeye Stage System served Columbus, Cincinnati, Elyria, and Sandusky; and the Cleveland-based Central Greyhound, associated with Greyhound Lines, operated throughout the eastern Midwest. The remaining smaller operators eventually either folded or merged with Greyhound or its major rival, Continental Trailways. Ultimately, in the 1980s both of these bus giants became one firm.

Although Cleveland never evolved into the region’s leading motor-carrier center, it benefited enormously from the steady growth of this transportation form. But in terms of truck production and truck transport, Cleveland profited greatly from the early innovations of the WHITE MOTOR CORP., which sent 5 experimental trucks in 1902 on a successful round-trip run from New York City to Boston. That company, which for several decades was Cleveland’s largest independent manufacturer in any field, remained in the forefront of truck development and production and also sported a sizable bus-building division. Small trucking concerns, often equipped with White vehicles, appeared before World War I; most provided intracity cartage. But with the triumph of the state’s good-roads movement in the 1920s and early 1930s, and subsequent heavy spending by Congress on federal highways, companies became regional and even interregional in scope.

The massive construction of the interstate highway network after 1956, the growing power of the Brotherhood of Teamsters, and other factors gave rise to motor-carrier consolidation. Cleveland was serviced by the industry’s “Big 5”: Roadway, Consolidated Freightways, Pacific Intermountain-Express, Yellow Freight, and McLean Trucking which, with federal deregulation in 1982, became only Roadway, Consolidated Freightways, and Yellow Freight. These companies and their competitors took advantage of the Cleveland market through such improved roadways as the Ohio Turnpike and interstates 71, 77, 90, 271, and 480. The presence of a vigorous motor-carrier enterprise and, to a lesser degree buses, reduced Clevelanders’ dependency on water and rail. Even though rubber-tired vehicles freed the shipper, local businesses here commonly experienced stiff competition from those in other communities who lacked access to a sophisticated Cleveland-type transportation infrastructure. The truck, more than any other transportation form, challenged Cleveland’s claim as the “best location in the nation.”

Clevelanders, though, could smile about their good fortune with AVIATION. Throughout the life of commercial aviation, the city benefited from virtually unequaled air service. Even prior to regularly scheduled passenger operations, Cleveland and a select number of other places enjoyed access to airmail flights. When the public began to travel by air after the mid-1920s, the local terminal never lacked for carriers. In the 1930s a number of companies provided service, but by World War II only 3 dominated: American, Pennsylvania-Central (subsequently Capital and then United) and Central itself. While regulators in the late 1940s opened the city to other strong firms, the number of carriers remained stable. Deregulation in 1978, however, ushered in a plethora of companies, and Cleveland became more of a “hub” operation. United, Cleveland’s largest airline, gradually left the area, and USAir and Continental replaced it as the primary carriers operating out of Hopkins Airport.

Passengers who used CLEVELAND-HOPKINS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT after the early 1960s enjoyed easy access to Public Square and other east and west side locations, for Cleveland could claim to be the city with the first rapid-transit line connecting its airport to the downtown area. The Cleveland Transit System (later the GREATER CLEVELAND REGIONAL TRANSIT AUTHORITY) was merely the latest operator of Cleveland’s surface rail network. Like most sister cities, Cleveland experienced all types of intracity transportation (see URBAN TRANSPORTATION). The earliest rolling stock to appear on its streets was the horse-drawn omnibus, the 19th century forerunner of the taxi. Omnibus runs started in 1857 and connected the railroad station and lake docks with various public houses. Soon though, the horse (and occasionally the mule) pulled an omnibus-type car on flanged wheels over light rails fixed in the streets. By the Civil War, these “streetcars” rolled on EUCLID AVE.. as far as Erie ( E. 9th) St., turning south on Prospect Ave. and east to the corporation limits. While horse lines flourished in the postwar period, they disappeared in the 1890s. Most communities with horsecars converted to the much more efficient and economical electric trolleys introduced in 1887.

While this transformation likewise occurred in Cleveland, an intermediate phase took place, the cable car phenomenon of the 1880s and early 1890s. Cleveland joined such places as Chicago, Cincinnati, Kansas City, and St. Louis in using cable cars. While inferior overall to the future trolley, the cable car was more desirable than the horsecar, largely because of its greater speed and lower operating cost. In the 1890s Cleveland’s 261,000 citizens rode cars belonging to the Cleveland City Cable Railway from UNION DEPOT up Water (W. 9th) St., and then east on Superior Ave.; or they could change to the Payne Ave. line that continued eastward to Lexington and Hough avenues. In 1893 the CCC became part of MARCUS HANNA†’s WOODLAND AVE. AND WEST SIDE RAILWAY CO., which took the name Cleveland City Railway. The cable lines continued to run throughout the 1890s, even though the faster and more reliable electric cars spread quickly throughout the city. The higher costs of cable operation and the difficulty of expansion led to conversion of the Superior line to trolleys in 1900; the remainder of the system met a similar fate a year later.

Not only did Cleveland’s developing electric streetcars spell doom for the horse and cable cars, but the substantial profit potential and the high capitalization requirements led to the unification of various electric lines in 1893. The result was the creation of 2, at times competing, systems, the CLEVELAND ELECTRIC RAILWAY CO. and the Cleveland City Railway Co. The local press called the former the “Big Consolidated” and the latter the “Little Consolidated,” which common parlance soon shortened to “Big Con” and “Little Con.” The urge to form a private monopoly led to merger of the “Big Con” and “Little Con” in 1903, creating “ConCon.” Although the city finally had its streetcar lines under a single management, consumers wanted a 3-cent fare, not the prevailing charge of 5 cents. Progressive mayor TOM L. JOHNSON† led the battle for a permanent solution to the “streetcar problem”–MUNICIPAL OWNERSHIP. During the Johnson years, reformers repeatedly fought “ConCon” over the fare issue through such consumer-sensitive alternative car lines as the Forest City Railway Co. (1903), Municipal Traction Co. (1906), Low Fare Railway Co. (1906), and Neutral St. Railway Co. (1908). With the establishment of the CLEVELAND RAILWAY CO. in 1910, a prolonged period of reasonable rates ensued, but true public control did not occur until 1942, when the CRC was purchased by the City of Cleveland and became the Cleveland Transit System.

The same technological change that affected the nature of 20th-century intercity travel likewise affected urban transit. “Jitney” buses invaded Cleveland streets before World War I but usually could not compete with the 3-cent trolley fares. Conventional buses joined the Cleveland Railway Co.’s transportation fleet during the 1920s, and eventually the trolley disappeared from Cleveland’s streets; the last streetcar rattled into its car barn from its Madison Ave. run on 24 Jan. 1954. Yet the use of rail transit did not end. The SHAKER HEIGHTS light rail line had since 1914 carried thousands of patrons daily (seeSHAKER HEIGHTS RAPID TRANSIT). Then in 1948, Mayor THOMAS A. BURKE† obtained a commitment from the federal government’s Reconstruction Finance Corp. to buy City of Cleveland revenue bonds to build a crosstown rapid-transit network. After a charter amendment gave an expanded transit board the necessary authority to manage such an operation, the Reconstruction Finance Corp. made the loan for $29.5 million in July 1951. Ground was broken on 4 Feb. 1952, and by the mid-1950s the “rapid” connected Windermere on the east side with W. 117th St. and Madison on the west side, through Terminal Tower on Public Square, and it entered the airport a decade later. In 1975 a revamping of the city’s transit system produced the Regional Transit Authority, which included the Shaker Hts. Rapid; thus the area’s rail and bus operations came under one governing body. During the 1980s, however, the continued exodus of population from the central city has reduced passenger travel on RTA. In 1994 the Gateway project, new home to the CLEVELAND INDIANS and the CLEVELAND CAVALIERS was directly connected with RTA at TOWER CITY CENTER and its use by fans was expected to improve the system’s ridership.

While competition between the various modes had characterized much of Cleveland’s transportation, the complete picture reveals striking examples of coordination and cooperation between transport forms. Obviously, intracity transit operations historically have united local stations and terminals. Trucks and buses, too, have served as vital links in the transportation chain. Less apparent have been the ties between the intracity water, rail, and air carriers. Steam railroads almost from their inception have made connections with lake vessels, especially those that hauled bulk commodities such as coal. In time interurbans offered interchange arrangements with passenger boats. The Northern Ohio Traction Co. established through tariffs for travelers on its system who were bound for Great Lakes cities on the Cleveland & Buffalo or Detroit & Cleveland boats. In the same vein, the NICKEL PLATE ROAD, virtually alone among Cleveland steam roads, promoted steam-electric railroad interchange of freight. A company advertisement in the early 1920s announced proudly: “A physical connection is made with the Nickel Plate Railroad at Cleveland, which permits the movement of Electric Railway Freight Cars into the Nickel Plate Freight terminal for the interchange of both carload and less-than-carload freight.” Like the Nickel Plate, the interurbans were hungry for any type of revenue business, and they commonly established remarkably creative relationships with other types of transport. The most fascinating are 2 traction companies’ dealings with the infant airline industry. In Feb. 1926, officials of the Northern Ohio Traction Co. inaugurated “Freight Aeroplane Service.” Package freight (largely automobile-related) moved by interurban to Cleveland, and then was trucked to the airport for a flight via the “New Ford Air Mail Service” to Detroit. Two years later, on 28 May 1928, the Cleveland & Southwestern claimed to be the first railroad in the nation to offer a through coordinated rail-air service. Interurban passengers purchased a Cleveland-to-Detroit airplane ticket on STOUT AIR SERVICES, INC. from any of 10 stations: Oberlin, Elyria, Wellington, Medina, Wooster, Ashland, Mansfield, Crestline, Galion, or Bucyrus.

Ultimately, the automobile and the motor truck reduced the service given by most of the incumbent forms of public transportation. Since the 1930s, these have been the modes that have altered dramatically the landscape of Cleveland and America; they have truly made the 20th century “the age of the rubber tire.” Cleveland, of course, has continued to benefit from those old 19th-century traffic arteries, Lake Erie boats, and the railroads. Moreover, it has exploited well the advantages of air service. Cleveland remains one of the best-served places in the nation.

H. Roger Grant

Univ. of Akron

From the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

The link is here

HIGHWAYS. Roads in Cleveland and other cities have served 2 main purposes. First, roads were built for commerce, including traffic movement and economic growth. Next, roads helped create and separate neighborhoods, allowing development of specialized districts for housing and business and an increase in property values. Inevitably, proponents of roads for traffic purposes came into conflict with those favoring the community and property interests of those living alongside. Officials in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County enjoyed only modest success in accommodating these conflicting goals. After 1900 state and federal officials financed part of the construction costs, leading to an upward shift in the level of conflict but no better luck in resolving it. The net result during the period between 1796-1990 was the creation of a vast and improved road network that never appeared affordable and adequate for traffic flow and local development. In 1796 MOSES CLEAVELAND† and his survey party reached the site of the city and began marking off streets for future settlement. The grid idea with a couple of radial routes prevailed. Cleaveland’s group sketched PUBLIC SQUARE, with Ontario running north to south and Superior east to west marking the center. Four additional streets bounded the outskirts of the area. In 1797 a second group of surveyors added 3 additional streets to the town plan. Actually, none of these streets existed; the marking of roads was simply a component in the division of land into lots for expeditious sale, the primary interest of the CONNECTICUT LAND CO. The net result of the 2 plattings, however, was to create a frame for Cleveland’s development that emphasized expansion toward the east and south. From 1810-15, only Superior and Water streets were open for travel, but tree stumps and bushes remained as obstacles. Ontario was open south of the square but was equally undeveloped.

During the 1820s, growth of a warehouse and wholesale district in the FLATS along the CUYAHOGA RIVER encouraged officials to develop adjacent roads. On the far north, Bath St. ran between the river and Water St. Farther south, 4 lanes allowed traffic to descend into the Flats from Water and Superior streets. Construction in 1824 of 2 bridges across the river linked commercial and residential development around Public Square with river traffic and the smaller west side. Approval and completion of a route, it appears, rested on a petition presented by property owners, along with the perception among officials that property values and trade would be enhanced. Streets constructed after 1820 often were named for leading businessmen and politicians who fostered commerce. Case St. honored LEONARD CASE†, a prominent real-estate developer. In 1836 the council dedicated Clark St. for Jas. S. Clark, who had constructed the Columbus Bridge with a view toward development of his property in the Flats.

After 1840 leaders in urban America undertook the task of improving their streets. In 1880 Geo. Waring, an engineer active in street and sanitary improvements, conducted a survey of street conditions in the nation’s cities. Half of the streets remained unpaved; only 2.5% of the paved roads were constructed of asphalt, a smooth, dust-free surface. During the 1870s, officials in cities such as New York, Cleveland, Chicago, and Washington, DC, had installed wooden blocks, which muffled the noise of horses and carts. But wooden streets, soaked in creosote oil as a preservative, fueled the fires that occasionally destroyed portions of major cities. Other surfaces included cobblestone and granite blocks, set on beds of sand, and gravel, the cheapest type of surface. Because abutters rather than the city usually financed improvements, the emphasis was on rapid extension of streets to houses and buildings in outlying districts rather than on securing the best surface. Many hoped that street improvements would encourage a quick increase in property values, perhaps leading to the creation of exclusive residential districts, such as Chicago’s Union Park and EUCLID AVE.. in Cleveland.

The desire for miles of cheap roadway guided street designers in Cleveland. By the early 1880s, a lengthy network of streets, bridges, and viaducts had been constructed. The city had increased in size to 26.3 sq. mi., and the number of streets had jumped to 1,155, running 444 mi. in length. The CENTRAL VIADUCT was under construction to connect the city at Ohio St. with outlying areas south and west. The quality of surfaces varied; approx. 92 mi. had been graded, and another 32 mi. graded and curbed. During the 1840s, city officials had paved Superior St., and by the 1880s paving, though still costly, had been applied to 58 mi. Altogether, 41% of the city’s streets were improved. However popular these improvements, neither the costs nor the construction materials proved satisfactory. During the mid-1880s, officials installed block stone over several streets, including Broadway, Woodland, Superior, and Erie, a length of 13 mi., at a cost of $723,000. But the block stone was in fact the third type of improvement attempted; earlier pavements, including asphalt, had become “unendurable” and had generated a “long controversy.” Nor was controversy limited to this particular project. During the early 1870s, property owners had petitioned the council to open 17 streets, including Payne and Sheriff. Approval rested on the legal requirement that petitioners would repay bonds issued by the city through tax assessments amounting to more than $1 million. Once the improvements were in place, however, several of the beneficiaries secured a court order preventing the city from collecting the taxes.

Around 1900, rapid increases in auto sales began to highlight older problems and create new ones for those charged with road building. Competition between trolley operators and motorists for limited space added a fresh dimension to the traditional question of whether roads should benefit traffic flow or property values. Unable to satisfy diverse constituencies, road officials accelerated the pace of improvements and extensions. Between 1900-40, officials at every level paved more than 1.2 million mi. Local authorities proved unable to finance such costly improvements, forcing the level of highway funding (and decision making) up to the state and federal levels. In fact, the “battle for the streets” in cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland prompted federal officials to contemplate funding the construction of a national expressway system. During the 1920s, road engineers and political leaders in the Cleveland region undertook major programs of extending and widening streets and roads. Federal and state funds were available for a number of these projects, which helped reduce the burden on local ratepayers and permitted more construction. Four-lane highways, replacing narrower and often twisting roads built prior to heavy traffic, were a popular design around Cleveland and many cities. On the far east, Kinsman, Euclid, and Lee roads were among those upgraded; and on the west, the 4-lane projects included West Lake Rd. Widening of older streets inside Cleveland proved slower and more costly, but engineers widened and resurfaced a large number, especially where trolleys and automobiles competed for space on narrow brick pavements. Projects such as the widening and extension of Chester from E. 13th to WADE PARK had to take place in sections of 8 to 10 blocks a year. In 1928 engineers counted nearly 1,800 mi. of roadway in the region constructed with federal, state, and county funds. Even more, they planned redevelopment and construction totaling 281 mi. in Cuyahoga County and another 312 mi. in the outlying areas at a cost of $63 million, exclusive of rights-of-way and damages.

Widening and extending roads failed to solve the traffic mess. In 1934, the low point of the Great Depression, county engineers surveyed traffic volume on major streets. During a 12-hour period, they counted 43,000 vehicles crossing the Superior Bridge. The outward movement of households and businesses added traffic along newer roads. Engineers counted 13,000 vehicles on Cedar Ave. west of Fairmount; 1,500 crossed Cedar at Warrensville, roughly the edge of suburban settlement. Leaders in politics and highway engineering added to the problem by spreading funds across numerous projects, partially satisfying demand and yet constructing roads that were below the standard of heavier and faster traffic. By the 1930s engineers had begun to define the problems of constructing a highway system in political rather than technical terms. Road building always required the support of politicians, and the difference after the 1920s is one of emphasis. In brief, engineers lacked the financial resources and legal remedies required to construct a road network adequate to traffic. Demand for road improvements routinely outstripped resources. Not until additional funds were made available and direction of road building centralized, many argued, could engineers improve the road network. Even during harsh Depression days, moreover, automobile registrations jumped 16%, and travel increased 45%. Truckers and motorists contended with traffic jams; downtown businessmen faced declining sales; and all endured the waste and tragedy of accidents. “Our street systems,” reported the Regional Assn. of Cleveland in 1941, “belong to the horse-and-buggy era.”

By the early 1940s, the construction of limited-access roads, popularly known as expressways, appeared to offer a solution to traffic jams and political stalemate. In 1939 the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads offered formal articulation of a plan for constructing a national expressway system. Within a year or two, road engineers and city planners formed committees to fix local routes and secure the support prerequisite to a lobbying campaign with state and federal governments. In Nov. 1944, members of the committee in Cleveland published a plan for expressway construction consisting of an inner and outer beltway plus 7 radial routes. Expressways would eventually serve 20% of the region’s traffic, or so ran the reasoning, drawing enough traffic from local roads to eliminate “need for many extensions and widenings.” Fewer autos on local streets, in this scheme, would “ensure quiet in the neighborhood,” encouraging residents not to seek “`greener pastures’ in the suburbs.” Proponents of expressways in Cleveland, as elsewhere, also promised a reduction in the number of accidents and, of course, “quick movement of heavy traffic.” Estimates of costs ran to $228 million during the course of 10 to 20 years, with the state and federal governments paying most of the bill.

The national expressway system was a popular idea. In 1944 members of Congress and Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt approved construction of the Interstate Highway System but failed to vote funds for construction costs. Despite the widespread celebration of such limited-access roads as the Pennsylvania Turnpike (opened 1940), leaders in the highway field, including truckers, economists, and the directors of farm and automotive groups, always sought to shift the financial burden of highway construction from themselves to general revenues, to taxes on other groups of road users, and to property owners. In cities such as Cleveland, debate revolved around the potential of expressways for serving urban renewal, resuscitating the downtown and speeding up traffic. Not until 1956 could members of Congress and Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower approve dedication of the gasoline tax to rapid development of the federal highway systems, particularly the Natl. System of Interstate & Defense Highways. During the mid-1950s, engineers in Cleveland spent $14 million to construct a section of the Innerbelt running 6/10 of a mile. In the future, federal officials would pay 90% of those costs, leaving the state responsible only for 10%. Free expressways proved no panacea in Cleveland. The scale of the interstate system, with its multiple lanes and wide interchanges, heightened the differences between those favoring traffic flow and others committed to property development. Conflict in the political arena began during the process of identifying routes. A route proposal submitted by a group of consulting engineers rested “solely on the basis of traffic,” the planning director of Cleveland advised the county engineer on 1 June 1954, and “would result in so great a disruption of over-all community plan that we cannot endorse it.” Route coordinates remained imprecise for several years pending the availability of funds. By Dec. 1957, however, the report of another consulting firm had it that “the primary purpose of a freeway is to serve traffic. . . .”

Between 1958 and the mid-1970s, planning and construction of the interstate system emerged as tangible facts on the landscape. Generally, those favoring traffic service predominated. The new Innerbelt, according to a report of 7 Oct. 1961 in the Cleveland PLAIN DEALER, “Loosens Downtown Traffic.” Occasionally, proponents of local development and property values managed to secure changes in routings and the elimination of extensions. In mid-1965, officials of the State Highway Dept. agreed to major changes in the location of interstate routes through the eastern suburbs. Observers noted that residents of these communities possessed wealth, which was imagined to translate directly into political protection, but unity and savvy were far more significant in the counsels of government. Traditional programs of road building and remodeling continued during the period of constructing the interstate system. The out-migration of households and businesses and a doubling of traffic during the first decade after World War II guided highway planners. From 1946 through the late 1950s, engineering staffs emphasized removal of bricks and streetcar tracks and repaving with concrete and asphalt. Beginning in 1946, officials spent $80,000 a mile to remodel Cedar Ave. between E. 2nd St. and E. 109th. The interstate system never refocused traffic toward downtown, nor did it encourage residents to remain in the city. By the late 1960s, officials had to extend main roads far to the south, west, and east in order to serve traffic and property in numerous subdivisions around the region. During the 1970s, attention in the region and nation shifted to repair and rehabilitation. Cleveland exhausted its funds, and other levels of government had to contend with inflation, declining resources, and fierce competition for road improvements.

 

From the early 19th century through the late 1970s, engineers, politicians, and developers in the Cleveland region directed the funding and construction of a large and up-to-date highway system. Materials and design approximated national standards in each period. Equally, road builders in the Cleveland region served the conflicting interests of highway users and adjoining owners of property. During the period up to ca. 1900, property enjoyed the greatest attention; thereafter, the crush of traffic forced greater attention to the design and siting of roads with a view toward vehicular service. After 1900, moreover, the momentum of highway building encouraged the training of professionals in the fields of road construction and land-use planning. Professional status conferred political and social legitimacy, allowing planners and engineers to interpret traffic and urban changes for politicians and residents. Engineers in the Cleveland region and nationwide held a larger influence and exercised a greater authority, especially because they had access to the revenues created by state and federal taxes on the sale of gasoline. Nonetheless, rarely could engineers in the Cleveland region–or in the nation as a whole–fund and construct the mileage demanded. During this entire period, road builders served the conflicting needs of a commercial civilization.

Mark H. Rose

Florida Atlantic Univ.

From the Encyclopedia of Cleveland

The link is here

URBAN TRANSPORTATION. During the last 150 years, transit in Greater Cleveland has gone from the horse and buggy to modern, diesel-powered buses and electric-rail coaches. Ownership has gone from small, privately owned, and minimally regulated systems (prior to 1910), to private corporations with tight public controls (1910-41), to city programs governed by a small board (1942-75); and to an autonomous regional authority (1975 to the present). Cleveland’s urban transit programs have run the gamut of problems and opportunities faced by all metropolitan systems, whose histories often have been complex and stormy.

The first urban transportation system established in the Cleveland area was the CLEVELAND & NEWBURGH RAILWAY, incorporated in 1834 by prominent Clevelanders. Operated by Silas Merchant, this line ran from a quarry atop Cedar Glen via Euclid to PUBLIC SQUARE, with passenger service commencing at the Railway Hotel at what is now E. 101st St. and Euclid. The line went bankrupt in 1840 and received close to a $50,000 as a subsidy from the county, but continued losing money and ceased operations in 1842. Ca. 1857, omnibuses, or “urban stagecoaches,” appeared on Cleveland’s streets. At first they ran between the downtown hotels and the railroad stations, saving patrons the trouble of carrying bags through “rutted, quagmire streets,” but they later extended service to “residential sections, remote business locales, and parks and water cures.” But omnibus travel, while more convenient than walking, was itself uncomfortable and unreliable. Horse-drawn carriages had difficulty on muddy streets, and omnibuses often did not operate in such conditions. Cleveland omnibus operator Henry S. Stevens sought a solution to this early urban transit problem and found it in the horse-drawn streetcar: rails secured in the streets made it easier for the horses to pull the cars in all sorts of weather. The first “oat-powered railway” in Ohio was introduced in Cincinnati in 1859; that year CLEVELAND CITY COUNCIL granted 2 of Stevens’s companies–the EAST CLEVELAND RAILWAY CO. and the Woodland Ave. Street Railroad Co. (later the Kinsman St. Railroad Co.)–franchises to lay rails in the streets. Service began regularly on 5 Sept. 1860; between 1863-76, 8 other companies were formed to operate lines along other streets.

To extend service from the end of these lines into the countryside, 3 suburban steam lines were organized in the late 1860s and 1870s. The CLEVELAND & NEWBURGH “DUMMY” RAILROAD, organized in 1868, ran from the Woodland-E. 55th St. barns to Broadway and Miles Ave.; its steam locomotives were disguised as passenger cars to fool horses, thus earning it the name “dummy” railroad. It operated until numerous accidents forced it into receivership in 1877. The Rocky River Railroad, organized in 1867, began at W. 58th and Bridge and ran to a resort called Cliff House; this line, instrumental in the development of LAKEWOOD, operated until 1882. The third such line was JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER†’s Lakeview & Collamer Railroad Co., in operation from 1875-81. In the 1870s, complaints about streetcar service were frequent. The uncoordinated transportation system required riders to take several different lines to reach their destinations and to pay a new fare on each. In 1879 TOM L. JOHNSON†, a veteran street railway businessman new to Cleveland, sparked the beginning of a prolonged struggle that would affect not only intracity transportation but local politics as well. He fought to enter the Cleveland street railway business, then worked to develop a single-fare ride from the west side into downtown. The CLEVELAND RAILWAY FIGHT OF 1879-83 pitted Johnson against banking, coal, iron, and shipping tycoon MARCUS ALONZO HANNA† and had profound implications for the future of local transportation.

Between 1879-93, the Cleveland transportation system was electrified and consolidated. As early as 1872, when the EPIZOOTIC epidemic struck area horses and brought most street railways to a halt (a few lines used mules, which were unaffected by the epidemic), street railway owners had sought other forms of motive power. The first local attempt to use electricity to power the cars came in July 1884, but proved unsatisfactory. Electrical power was used successfully by the East Cleveland St. Railway Co. on 18 Dec. 1888; it began running 4 electrical cars the next day and extended its electric service to Public Square on its Euclid line in July 1889. The first electric car to reach the Square, however, had been on the South Side Railroad’s Jennings Ave. (W. 14th) line on 19 May 1889. By 1894 all but 2 lines in Cleveland had been electrified; these were the Payne Ave. and Superior St. lines of FRANK ROBISON†’s Cleveland City Cable Railway Co. Cars on these lines were powered by cable ropes pulled through concrete tubes by large flywheels located in powerhouses. The city’s first cable car appeared on 17 Dec. 1890 on the Superior Line; the change from horse-drawn cars to cable cars was gradual, but Robison had adopted cable cars after they had become outmoded by electricity. The Superior line was electrified in July 1900, the Payne line in Jan. 1901–the latter carried the last cable car in Cleveland on 19 Dec. 1901.

Prior to 1893, Cleveland had 8 different companies operating 22 different lines. Consolidation of these scattered lines began in the 1880s. In 1885 the Kinsman St. Railroad Co. (operating the Woodland and Kinsman lines) merged with Hanna’s West Side Railway Co. (Detroit, Lorain, and Franklin-W. Madison lines) to form the WOODLAND AVE. AND WEST SIDE RAILWAY CO.. In 1889 Frank Robison’s Cleveland City Cable Railway Co. was formed by the mergers of the St. Clair St. Railroad Co. with the Superior Railroad Co. (Payne and Superior lines). In Mar. 1893 the CLEVELAND ELECTRIC RAILWAY CO. was formed by the merger of Azariah Everett’s EAST CLEVELAND RAILWAY CO. (Euclid, Cedar, Wade Park, Garden [Central], Quincy, and Mayfield lines) with Joseph Stanley’s BROADWAY & NEWBURGH STREET RAILROAD CO. (Broadway and Belt lines); in April the Cleveland Electric Railway added Tom and Al Johnson’s Brooklyn St. Railroad Co. (Pearl, Scovill, and Abbey Lines) and their South Side St. Railroad Co. (Jennings [W. 14th], Scranton and Clark, and Fairfield lines). The Cleveland Electric became known as the Big Consolidated, and shortly after its mergers were completed, the Little Consolidated–more properly the Cleveland City Railway Co.–took shape in May when Robison’s Cleveland City Cable Co. merged with Hanna’s Woodland Ave. & West Side Street Railroad.

Cleveland Electric suffered through a violent strike in 1899 (see STREETCAR STRIKE OF 1899), but for the most part it did battle with the Little Con until acquiring it in July 1903. For the rest of the decade, Cleveland Electric fought with reform mayor Tom L. Johnson, who argued for a 3-cent fare andMUNICIPAL OWNERSHIP of the lines, using the battle to educate the people about the evils of “privilege” and the benefits of public ownership. The railway disputes eventually were brought before the U.S. District Court, Northern Ohio, where the determined efforts of Judge ROBERT WALKER TAYLER†, a superb conciliator and mediator, resolved the issue. His “Cost of Living Service,” released on 15 Mar. 1909, was based on the premise that “the community never pays more than the cost of service rendered; that the owners of the property never, by any device, get more than 6% on the agreed amount of their investment; and that the community will at all times know just how the property is being operated and have the power to correct any abuse either of management or of service.” This was the basis of the Tayler Franchise adopted by Cleveland City Council in Dec. 1909 and approved by the voters in Feb. 1910. When the franchise became operational 1 March 1910, it inaugurated a new era in Cleveland’s transportation history. Franchises of the former competing companies were given to the CLEVELAND RAILWAY CO.; appraised value was $14,675,000. Guidelines for costs and changes were prescribed. The innovative agreement provided for the position of city street railroad commissioner (appointed and removed only by the mayor but paid by the company), for boards of arbitration, and for municipal ownership, when such was permitted under Ohio’s constitution. Cleveland’s public/private system caught the attention of the nation. Mayor NEWTON D. BAKER† appointed PETER WITT† as railroad commissioner, who scrutinized every move of the company. Witt also pioneered the “skip-stop” plan, under which inbound cars stopped at every other street and outbound ones at the other. Because each patron walked 1 additional block per day, service was faster. He also developed and patented the “Pete Witt Car,” which had front and rear doors for entrance and exit.

The system that brought Cleveland some of the best and cheapest service in the nation was not immune to the Depression of the 1930s. Decreased patronage, inability to meet fixed charges, including the 6% return, and continued use of aging equipment spurred interest in public ownership. An Analytical Survey of the Cleveland Railway Co., completed in July 1937, carried overtones of the inevitability of public transit ownership, which finally arrived in 1942. Twenty years after the Ohio constitution had permitted a city to purchase a transit system, Cleveland’s city council passed an ordinance for the purchase, transit bonds amounting to $17.5 million were issued, and at midnight 23 April 1942 Cleveland took possession of the system. Operation and management became part of the Department of Public Utilities under Commissioner Walter J. McCarter until 3 Nov. 1942 when voters approved a charter amendment establishing an independent transit board “to supervise, manage and control the transportation system.” The 3-member board, appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the city council, began to function on 1 Jan. 1943; its first chairman was William C. Reed. McCarter continued as the system’s first general manager. Although the amended city charter completely separated the administration of transportation from other public utilities, the city council retained the right to approve new capital expenditures, the acquisition of other transit systems or franchise extensions, and the disposal transit system property. With these exceptions, the CTS board followed the model of the directors of a private corporation–to determine policies and to give the general manager responsibility for operations.

The city’s performance with public transit was successful until the late 1960s. During World War II ridership had increased rapidly as automobile manufacturing ceased, gasoline was rationed, and employees, including many more women, worked more days per week. With a prosperous CTS, the 1942 debt, scheduled for repayment in 20 years, was redeemed in half the time. A 1951 Reconstruction Finance Corp. loan of $29.5 million was granted by the federal government for the purchase of vehicles for improvements in surface facilities, and for assistance with the construction of a rapid rail system. In exchange for the loan, the RFC insisted that the transit system be free of all oversight by Cleveland City Council and that the number of transit board members be increased to 5. The city council retained its right to approve board appointees, to dispose of the system as a whole, and to issue CTS bonds. Operation of the rapid transit between Windermere and Public Square began on 15 March 1955; service to the west side to W. 117 St. began on 14 August 1955 and was extended to the airport in 1968, making Cleveland the first city in the Western Hemisphere to have rapid-rail transit from the center city to the airport. While the east-west rapid transit marked another milestone in the city’s transportation history, buses, first used extensively in the 1920s, proved more flexible if less glamorous than rail-bound streetcars, which were gradually phased out–the last one ran on 24 Jan. 1954. CTS was a “profit-making” venture between 1942-67, but it lost $483,474 in 1968, $1,774,861 in 1970. Charged with operating from the farebox, Cleveland could no longer hold fares to $.50 for local rides without additional sources of income, but the city was reluctant to give up control of the failing system to a regional authority despite its increasing deficits. In Dec. 1974 the GREATER CLEVELAND REGIONAL TRANSIT AUTHORITY was created to rescue CTS and to consolidate the other local transit companies operating in the area. Cuyahoga County voters overwhelmingly approved a 1% sales tax in July 1975 to subsidize RTA’s operations and a new, lower fare structure became effective in September.

The mix of RTA’s revenue sources changed dramatically because much of the new system’s income now came from public sources instead of the farebox. By 1985 total revenues were $135.4 million, with passenger fares bringing in only $36.8 million; the sales tax contributed $77.9 million, the state chipped in $6.8 million, and Federal Operational Assistance provided $11.3 million. In addition, significant monies for new rolling stock, system upgrade, and route expansion were received from the federal government on a matching basis.

The regional authority was not the panacea hoped for in 1975. Although ridership increased from 78 million in 1974 to 130 million in 1980, it began to decline again, this time to 59.97 million in 1993, reflecting the continuing exodus of the city’s population and businesses. Diminishing passenger traffic, reductions in federal subsidies, and reduction in anticipated revenues from sales taxes forced RTA to raise fares and cut service. In 1982 the local fare was raised to $.85 and it continued to escalate, reaching $1.25 for local rides in 1993. Hoping to increase ridership, RTA built a walkway from its TOWER CITY CENTER station to the new Gateway sports center to provide efficient transit service for fans attending CLEVELAND INDIANS andCLEVELAND CAVALIERS games.

Dallas Young (dec.)

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Christiansen, Harry. Northern Ohio’s Interurbans and Rapid Transit Railways (1965).

——. Trolley Trails through Greater Cleveland and Northern Ohio (1975).

Morse, Kenneth S. P. Cleveland Streetcars (1955).