Collins v. Public Service Com.

• Decision Date: 17 October 1924
• Docket Number: 309-1923
• Parties: Collins et al., Appellants, v. Public Service Commission
• Court: Pennsylvania Superior Court

84 Pa.Super. 58

Collins et al., Appellants, v. Public Service Commission

No. 309-1923

Superior Court of Pennsylvania

October 17, 1924

Argued March 14, 1924

Appeal by complainants, from order of the Public Service Commission of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Complaint Docket, No 7522, 1923, refusing certificate of public convenience to Chester Auto Bus Line.

Petition to the Public Service Commission for certificate of public convenience.

The facts are stated in the opinion of the Superior Court.

The Public Service Commission refused to grant a certificate. The petitioners appealed.

Error assigned was, among others, the order of the commission.

Affirmed.

Albert Dutton MacDade, and with him Joseph H. Taulane, for appellants.

Howard E. Hannum, for intervening appellee. Frank M. Hunter Counsel, and with him John Fox Weiss, Assistant Counsel, for the Public Service Commission.

Before Orlady, P. J., Porter, Henderson, Trexler, Keller, Linn and Gawthrop, JJ.

OPINION

PORTER, J.

The appellants, having taken the necessary preliminary steps to secure a charter, filed their application with the Public Service Commission for approval of the incorporation of the Chester Auto Bus Line and for a Certificate of Public Convenience authorizing the Chester Auto Bus Line to begin the exercise and privilege of operating motor busses as a common carrier of passengers for hire over certain routes in the City of Chester. The Southern Pennsylvania Bus Company, a corporation to which the Public Service Commission had already issued a certificate of public convenience authorizing the operation of motor busses over practically the same routes; the Southern Pennsylvania Traction Company and a large number of operators of jitneys filed protests against the granting of a certificate of public convenience to the appellants, alleging among other grounds of protest, that the particular section of the city referred to in the application of the appellants was already sufficiently served by existing lines of common carriers, and that the public convenience would rather be impaired than promoted by the entry therein of the proposed new corporation. Public hearings were held, testimony was taken, and the case was argued before the commission. The result was that the Public Service Commission refused to issue the certificate prayed for and dismissed the petition, from which action we have this appeal.

It seems clear that if the public service company law is to be regarded as controlling, the question was entirely within the jurisdiction of the commission. What number of motor vehicles operated as common carriers of passengers for hire would promote the public safety, convenience and comfort of a given community is surely not a question of law. The opinion filed by Mr. Ainey, chairman of the commission, sets forth an appropriate reason for the action of the commission. There is nothing in the record that would warrant us to declare it to be an illegal reason, unless we accept as sound the doctrine urged by the able counsel for the appellants, to wit, that " The use of the streets of the City of Chester is in the absolute keeping of the city and no power or agency of the State could grant any power or authority to any individual or corporation to use the streets of the City of Chester without the consent of the City of Chester first had and obtained."

The Public Service Commission had, prior to the application of these appellants, granted a certificate of public convenience to the Southern Pennsylvania Bus Company, authorizing the operation of motor vehicles as common carriers of passengers for hire over substantially the same routes upon which the appellants propose to operate. The commission found after a full hearing upon the application of these appellants that there was no necessity for the grant of the right to operate by a second bus company, saying: " There can be no question that one bus service would be ample for all requirements, nor that, if two were established, they would destroy each other and thus deprive the public of service necessary for its accommodation and convenience." That this finding was in all respects correct was conceded by the petitioners in the proceedings before the Public Service Commission and they here frankly so concede in their brief as follows: " If the Southern Pennsylvania Bus Company had a franchise and could operate autobusses along the streets of the City of Chester, the present applicants would not have presented their petition because there would not have been business enough for two rival companies along the same route, but as the Southern Pennsylvania Bus Company cannot operate because it has no franchise from the City of Chester there is no reason why the Chester Auto Bus Line should not be...