A busy corner at 9th and Walnut Streets, with the old post office in the background, is pictured on a photographic post card, with passengers boarding double open-air streetcars, at a point where, according to the post card's legend, the cable lines transfer north, east, south and west. It was good service for Kansas Citians in an era before the automobile was common and when most Kansas Citians lived in an area north of 31st Street. The Metropolitan Street Railway Company operated the system in Kansas City and Kansas City, Kansas, and was a consolidation of several street railway lines that received franchises at various periods in the city's growth. Bernard Corrigan became president of the company in 1902. He died in 1914. Carrie Whitney, historian, described the streetcar system: Some of the lines were once horse car lines, some cable lines and some electric. All are electric in 1908 except a portion of the 12th Street lines, between Washington Street and the stockyards. (There) the cable line is used pending the construction of some kind of a trafficway between the higher and lower levels of the city. Ordinances of 1899 and 1902 confirmed the five-cent fare, established universal free transfers and provided a five-cent fare to the city's Swope Park, which lay outside the city limits. The company agreed to pay the city 8 percent of its gross earnings, out of which the city was first to pay all the state, school and county taxes levied against the company. The Metropolitan Street Railway operates all the street railways in both Kansas Citys except the interurban line of the Kansas City Leavenworth electric line. It also operates the lines to Independence, Fairmount Park, Swope Park and Marlborough. The system in 1908 includes 223 miles of single track. About 600 streetcars are in service. A report of May 1907, said the company carried, in a 25-month period, something over one hundred and 36 million persons. The last streetcar run in Kansas City was June 23, 1957. The buses, which already had been in operation for some time, took over. Eventually street car tracks were covered over in street resurfacing. A few still remain exposed. Perhaps the old streetcars were hot in summer and cold in winter, but they ran regularly and got you there, almost anywhere, for five cents. Kansas City Times, June 1, 1979.
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