GEORGE A. GONZALEZ - fieldi

THE RISE OF THE AUTOMOBILE 57apart” (241; also see Ward 1964 and Yago 1984). As a result of cautious expansionstrategies, European trolley firms were largely of good financial health.Moreover, these firms were in better standing with the general public thantheir U.S. counterparts. In contrast to the European experience, McKay holdsthat in the United States “free-wheeling entrepreneurial activity, which operatedso successfully beyond effective public control, . . . built up strongantipathies” among the general public toward streetcar companies (95).Antipathies that historians Paul Barrett (1983) and Scott Bottles (1987) go togreat lengths to document in the cases of Chicago and Los Angeles, respectively.In the contemporary era, fixed rail transportation persists throughouturban centers in Western and Central Europe. This is facilitated, to varyingdegrees, through the integration of planning for urban development andplanning for mass rapid transport. Additionally, mass rapid transport, includingfixed rail, is an attractive option for commuters because European governmentsassess high excise taxes on the consumption of gasoline. 3 The resultof these factors are cities that are generally more compact, and less dependenton the automobile, than those in North America (Hall 1995; Nivola andCrandall 1995; Kenworthy and Laube 1999; Nivola 1999; Beatley 2000; Feitelsonand Verhoef 2001).In the next section, I shift our attention specifically to the rise of theautomobile in the United States. The sprawl that occurred in urban NorthAmerica through the deployment of the electric streetcar during the late nineteenthand early twentieth centuries helped pave the way for the adoption ofthe automobile during the 1920s in three ways. First, trolley lines moved largeportions of the urban populace out of walking distance from city centers.Hence, the sprawl facilitated by trolley systems created a sizable, and largelymiddle and upper class (Jackson 1985; Fishman 1987), populace dependent onrapid transportation to gain access to goods, services, and employment (Fogelson2001). Second, the traffic congestion on trolley lines that sprawl helpedcreate in many major cities made the automobile an attractive alternative tothe streetcar (Foster 1981; Barrett 1983; Bottles 1987). Third, as the automobilebecame a serious competitor of trolleys in the 1920s, trolley firms were lessable to adjust and respond to this competitor since its finances were underminedby unprofitable lines which ran through low population density zones.Importantly, the finances of most trolley firms made investments in subwaysor elevated tracks an impossibility (Dewees 1970). These investments couldhave given streetcars their own right-of-way, free of automobiles and otherforms of traffic (Cheape 1980; Derrick 2001; Boschken 2002).POLITICS AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE AUTOMOBILEJames Flink’s (1975; 1990) seminal history of the automobile revolution in theUnited States emphasizes the technological, organizational, and marketing