20th October.
THE question whether the single or double trailery system is to be adopted for the tramways which we hope to see some day running in Shanghai is a very serious one. It appears to be feared that the Municipal Council have practically decided on adopting the single trolley system, a decision which meets with strong and well-funded opposition from the Director of the Sicawei Observatory, the Administration of the Imperial Chinese Tel graphs, the Cable Companies, and the Gas and Water Companies, all institutions of the greatest value to Shanghai, and whose arguments therefore must be very carefully considered.
Itis repres nted tht the establishment of an electric tramway on the single trolley system may, and undoubtedly will, lead to consequ-' ences which the general community hardly realise, The conditions of the allavially-formed soil of Shanghai, which is saturated with water three or four feet below the crust on which our city is erected, are very different to those of the majority of towns where tramways are successfully operated on the single trolley system, and this has always been the g: eat objection to placing our electric light wires underground. It is urged that the adoption here of the single trolley system will, we may say certainly, result in the closing of the Sicawei Observatory, which will have to be removed to the Hills: a very serious interference with Shanghai's telegraphic communication with the rest of the world, and with the telephone service; and enormous damage to the pipes of our gas and water companies. What the removal of the Sicawei Observatory means was shown in the minutes recently published of the meeting of the Committee of the Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce. 15 means the completion of the road to the Hills, an immediate expense roughly estimated at Ts. 50,000 to Tls. 60,000, in new buildings and their installation, and an annual extra expense of Tls. 3,000 a year, plus the inconvenience of the greater distance of the new Observatory from Shanghai, If the ratepayers of Shanghai are more or less indifferent—but we hope this is not true—to the good working of the Observatory, they will surely not be indifferent to a matter where their own pockets are concerned, and they will strongly object t" the threatened loss on their gas and water shares, It is understood that the French Municipal Council has decided to adopt the double trolley system for its tramways, and it is surely most reasonable that the tramways on both sides of the Yangkingpang should be worked on the same system.
The question is, it will be seen, one of the highest importance, and evry point should be most carefully considered before the final decision is taken by our Municipal authorities, It must not be thought there is some exaggeration in the above statement of the evils that will flow from the adoption of the single trolley system, The only advantage of the system favoured apparently by the Council's advisers is that the cost is somewhat smaller, a consideration with concessionaires who propose to instal the tramways and then sell out; but in a period of, say, ten years the saving in electrical output by the adoption of the double trolley system would fully make up for the extra first cost. But even if the cost of the better system is larger, we should in the general interest follow the example of the French Municipal Council, and strenuously refuse t2 entertain the idea of being content with the dangerous single trolley system,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.