Public Serv. Comm. v. United Railwys Elec. Co.

I concur in what Judge Parke has written, but would add these remarks in elaboration of some portions of it. It seems to me that, so long as the present equipment and service of the utility are necessary to the public, it is a mistake to say that the ordinarily fair return on that property may be pared down at all merely because there were formerly more riders for it, more profitably distributed. The fair return on a utility property, for the service rendered with it, is to be calculated on present conditions only. The Supreme Court of the United States has said that the problem of a fair return is a problem of day by day, month by month, and year by year, as service continues. Denver v. Denver Water Co., 246 U.S. 178; DetroitUnited Ry. Co. v. Detroit, 248 U.S. 429. I take it that if a new owner — a purchaser at a sale, for instance — should offer to meet the existing need with the same or similar equipment, he could not be denied the ordinary fair return on property of such value merely because conditions were better at some previous time. Another and different situation would be presented if it could be found as a fact that this sort of service cannot get the fair return because the service would not be worth so much to users; but I do not see the foundation for that finding in this case. The evidence given on the point goes only so far as to predict that a fare of ten cents would keep away two per cent. of the present users. And, beyond that testimony, if the full fair return requires a fare of so much, ten cents, comparison of that amount with prices generally paid for other services, bus fares, for instance, or fares of steam or interurban electric railways for similar mileage, or prices paid for cheap commodities and entertainments, seems to me to render it impossible to say that it is more than street railway transportation for an average of some miles is worth to riders.

Judge Parke authorizes me to add that these views are in accordance with his own.