View Full Version : Oklahoma City-Norman Interurban streetcar



BG918
02-25-2007, 10:08 PM
Does anyone here remember the old Oklahoma City-Norman interurban? I know it ran from downtown Norman to downtown Oklahoma City, like the commuter rail proposals we've heard from local leaders. Did it run on the tracks or the streets? And if it worked then, why couldn't it work now?

Moving along with transportation Journal Record, The (Oklahoma City) - Find Articles (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4182/is_19991216/ai_n10132451)

jbrown84
02-25-2007, 10:36 PM
I believe it was on the street.

Pete
02-26-2007, 08:12 AM
This is from Wikipedia:


The Oklahoma Railway Company (ORy) operated three interurban lines and several streetcar lines in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and the surrounding area from 1904 to 1947.

Freight traffic was also handled on the interurban lines as well as a few of the streetcar lines. The Guthrie Division saw perhaps the greatest amount of this traffic due to a connection with the Fort Smith and Western Railroad at Guthrie.

As World War II approached, the company began to shift focus away from interurban/streetcar operation towards buses; as a result, the company began to gradually abandon its rail operations. As part of this action, several line segments were leased, then sold to the Santa Fe and the Rock Island.

The three interurban lines were:

* Norman Division - Oklahoma City to Norman
* Guthrie Division - Oklahoma City to Guthrie
* El Reno Division - Oklahoma City to El Reno

redland
02-26-2007, 12:15 PM
The OKC-Norman Interurban ran from the downtown terminal on Grand Avenue (now Sheridan) southward down the middle of Shields Boulevard and thence to Moore and Norman's Main Street terminal.

Kerry
02-26-2007, 03:52 PM
According to the artical there were 52,000,000 riders per year in the 1940's. In 1940 the OKC population was 200,000. Then the system was bought by a bus line, the rails were paved over, and passenger count dropped to only 2,000,000 a year. Then, big surprise, the bus company folded.

Maybe the nay-sayers are right. OKC with a population of 1.2 million isn't big enough to support rail.

writerranger
02-26-2007, 11:26 PM
According to the artical there were 52,000,000 riders per year in the 1940's. In 1940 the OKC population was 200,000. Then the system was bought by a bus line, the rails were paved over, and passenger count dropped to only 2,000,000 a year. Then, big surprise, the bus company folded.

Maybe the nay-sayers are right. OKC with a population of 1.2 million isn't big enough to support rail.

It happened at the same time that all the city rail services were being shut down - and - it was all a big conspiracy (really!). Read my post here:
http://www.okctalk.com/okc-metro-area-talk/8442-light-rail-bond-ideas.html?#post78317

---------------------------

Kerry
02-27-2007, 06:47 PM
writerranger,

You don't need need to sell me on the consipracy theory. At the close of WWII, Goodyear, GM, and Standard Oil has made a lot of money as defense conractors. They were flushed with money but could see that the gravey train was over. Their solution was to buy the passenger rail systems and put in buses. As you can see, even back then no one wanted to ride a bus.

BG918
02-28-2007, 01:21 AM
Probably the biggest industrial conspiracy of all time. What GM did to the streetcar systems across the United States radically changed the future urban landscape in our cities and society in general. The car would never have been as popular as it is now without GM systematically buying up most of the streetcar companies and then replacing them with bus routes.