
General Motors Streetcar Conspiracy - Tomte
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy
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amyjess
A couple of fascinating takeaways from this that don't get brought up very
often when the conspiracy is mentioned:

\- Streetcars were already failing when GM and their cohorts swooped in. They
just accelerated the collapse and took advantage of it to enrich themselves.
In fact, the reason GM's puppet was able to acquire and shut down all these
streetcar companies was because the industry was dying, and the owners of
those wanted to sell before the bottom fell out.

\- The purpose of the conspiracy was not to promote private car ownership but
to replace streetcars with buses, as GM and their cohorts stood to make money
hand over fist because they were major players at every level of the supply
chain for buses, while none of them were really involved in the supply chain
for streetcars.

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jhbadger
During the Great Depression the US WPA hired unemployed writers to write
travel guides to various US cities. I have a copy of the book for Los Angeles.
What I found interesting is how the fabled Pacific Electric "red cars" (the
streetcar system of Los Angeles and suburbs) were described. While they are
often romanticized and used as a prime example of what GM destroyed, the book
describing them in the 1930s wasn't that favorable, mentioning how slow and
unreliable they were.

~~~
amyjess
They were also just straight-up replaced by buses.

The main bus lines in the older parts of a good chunk of cities still follow
the old streetcar lines.

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m0llusk
This leverages a lot of modern political ideas to attempt to understand the
past. The streetcar networks got through the war dilapidated from low
maintenance because workers and materials were needed for the war effort.
People hated the streetcars for being rough and uncomfortable, freezing in
cold weather, broiling in heat, forcing all classes and types to squeeze
together. The general feeling was that cars and buses on big roads were the
future. Why rebuild a decaying streetcar network that no one loved when people
preferred roads? Passing this off as conspiracy back in the day would probably
get you accused of Communist sympathies.

