Detroit electric interurban railways, 1913 Size:14x14 (The system went all the

(The system went all the way to Corvallis and Eugene

This is the system map that existed in 1930

Fisher and Merrick even opened up their own streetcar companies to serve their new developments

and Seattle came within a nose of having the federal government fund a full-blown subway system

Detroit electric interurban railways, 1913 Size:14x14 (The system went all theIn 1913, Detroit was booming, and was the cutting edge of the industrial era. It was what Silicon Valley is today. But in 1913, the automobile was a brand new technology the Ford Model T had only gone into production in 1908, and the freeway era was still a half century away. In this period, Detroiters got around the region by train (we'd recognize it today as a form of electric light rail) and travel times would be competitive with modern driving.