About: The General Motors vs. San Diego Electric Railway streetcar conspiracy theory   Sponge Permalink

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The General Motors streetcar conspiracy refers to convictions of General Motors (GM) and other companies for monopolising the sale of buses and supplies to National City Lines and its subsidiaries, and to allegations that this was part of a deliberate plot to purchase and dismantle streetcar systems in many cities in the United States as an attempt to monopolize surface transportation, and to urban legends and other folklore inspired by these events.

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  • The General Motors vs. San Diego Electric Railway streetcar conspiracy theory
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  • The General Motors streetcar conspiracy refers to convictions of General Motors (GM) and other companies for monopolising the sale of buses and supplies to National City Lines and its subsidiaries, and to allegations that this was part of a deliberate plot to purchase and dismantle streetcar systems in many cities in the United States as an attempt to monopolize surface transportation, and to urban legends and other folklore inspired by these events.
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  • The General Motors streetcar conspiracy refers to convictions of General Motors (GM) and other companies for monopolising the sale of buses and supplies to National City Lines and its subsidiaries, and to allegations that this was part of a deliberate plot to purchase and dismantle streetcar systems in many cities in the United States as an attempt to monopolize surface transportation, and to urban legends and other folklore inspired by these events. Between 1938 and 1950, National City Lines and its subsidiaries, American City Lines and Pacific City Lines—with investment from GM, Firestone Tire, Standard Oil of California through a subsidiary, Federal Engineering, Phillips Petroleum, and Mack Trucks—gained control of additional transit systems in about 25 cities. Systems included St. Louis, Baltimore, Los Angeles, and Oakland. NCL often converted streetcars to bus operations in that period, although electric traction was preserved or expanded in some locations. Other systems, such as San Diego's, were converted by outgrowths of the City Lines. Most companies involved were convicted in 1949 of conspiracy to monopolise interstate commerce in the sale of buses, fuel, and supplies to NCL subsidiaries, but were acquitted of conspiring to monopolize the transit industry. The story as an urban legend has been studied extensively by Martha Bianco, Scott Bottles, Sy Adler, Robert Post, and Jonathan Richmond. It has been explored several times in print, film and other media, notably in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Taken for a Ride, and The End of Suburbia. Only a handful of U.S. cities have surviving effective rail-based urban transport systems based on streetcars, including Newark, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, New Orleans, and Boston; others are re-introducing them. In many of these cases, the "streetcars" do not actually ride on the street. Boston had all of its downtown lines elevated, or buried, by the mid-1920s, and most of the surviving lines at grade operate on their own right of way. San Francisco and Newark similarly use tunnels.
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