National Reports:

...The car in public policy is privileged...

...In fact, they have encouraged its forays...

...Though these items were on the Congressman's agenda, they were barely touched upon...

...Last summer Celler, as chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee, cited the Port Authority for contempt of Congress on the charge that the Port Authority failed to deliver confidential documents to the subcommittee...

...This attitude of the Authority to railroad problems is indicative of its lopsided planning...

...After weeks of attack and counterattack, threats of perjury and contempt, the panoply of both sides is slightly spattered, but the combatants are otherwise unscathed...

...Only the state can change this...

...These are not to be condoned, but several important questions have been brought to the fore and as yet remain unanswered...

...The city has suffered from the Authority's tendency to pick the plums and leave the prunes...

...Celler, however, unwilling to wait for the court's decision, initiated hearings on the question of whether Congress should continue its approval of the Authority...

...This, of course, accounts for its financial success, but also, as one critic noted, its "overall failure...

...In the words of The Wall Street Journal, it is "adrift on a sea of autonomy...

...Yet over 100,000 more cars enter the city today than in 1950...

...Moreover, the Port Authority is immobilized by pride, petulance and myopia...

...Most cities—though Philadelphia is an enlightened exception—have attempted a cure by treating consequences rather than causes...

...Rarely have the Governors vetoed an action proposed by the Authority, and the state legislatures have an equally laissez-faire attitude —due primarily to the beneficent corporate image of public service that the Authority has spread by means of munificent public relations budgets of $25,000 a year...

...Whether the Port Authority of its own volition will change its policies and redress the balance between the railroads and the automobile seems doubtful...

...Celler, in turn, dismissed these allegations as either false or rehashes of old misunderstandings...

...Yet the results, considering the size of the Authority's facilities and revenue, were paltry: Funds in some instances were deposited without accruing interest, occasionally money was borrowed at slightly below the going prime rates, and one official was dismissed for taking bribes...

...This is but a reflection of a private predilection: To quote Lewis Mumford, the car is often "treated like a private mistress, not included in the family budget no matter how extravagant her demands upon the purse...

...the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad has been operating in the red for the last 22 months, to cite but one typical case...

...Tobin receives a salary of $60,000, which in Government service is surpassed only by the United States President...

...a free-lance writer, frequently writes on New York City...

...It has also kept its hands clear of subways and buslines...

...10,000 more, it should be noted, than Governor Rockefeller...

...Thus, though approved by the Federal Government and created by the states, in actuality the Authority is responsible to no one...

...Austin J. Tobin, the imperious and adamant executive director of the Port Authority, managed to get in one or two licks for his side at the hearings...

...Since commuter railroads easily fall into the Port Authority's domain, the Authority, if it wished, could undertake some measure of relief for both rails and the public...

...Cities, too, are reluctant to move against the car...

...It may be too soon to evaluate the most recent hearings, but the net results thus far are questionable and rather disappointing...

...In effect, by catering to private transportation the Authority has pulled the financial rue...

...from under railroads and buses...

...On its own for 39 years, the Port Authority has grown sleek and prosperous...

...Its sweeping jurisdiction for transportation facilities within a 25mile radius of New York City has never ceased to expand...

...The Port Authority was established in 1921 by Al Smith and Walter Edge, the Governors of New York and New Jersey...

...Fifty cars were purchased just a few weeks ago, but the money has been on hand for 16 months...

...The wisdom of this move is questioned by many observers, for it would embroil the Government in regulating 35 other multi-state authorities, and possibly 3,000 other miscellaneous authorities (e.g., in roads, housing, power, etc...

...The drawings are by Ruth Marossi...

...Public protest has met with indifference...

...Recently the Regional Plan Association stated: "The Port Authority is like a workhorse that won't take its blinders off...

...The problem is not a question of transferring power, but of reactivating it...

...The Port Authority, under the nominal control of the two states' Governors, has become a power unto itself...

...Instead of seeking an integrated transport system for New York City, one that would utilize public facilities more fully in order to reduce the number of private cars that are presently choking the streets, the Port Authority has widened the sluice gates...

...Today its empire consists of four bridges and tunnels for motor vehicles, six marine terminals, five airports and a bus and a truck terminal—'totalling over $1 billion in assets...

...Now that the new Congress has convened, Celler may perhaps bring the investigation back to its originally professed purpose and stop snipping at indiscretions, misdemeanors and dubious practices...

...Indeed, widening highways and increasing parking facilities simply motivates more motorists to venture into urban areas, compounding the existing traffic congestion...

...An investigation would seem to be in order...

...This, the Port Authority has encouraged, welcomed and facilitated...

...The Port Authority only reluctantly acknowledges that the railroads can transport about 20 times as many riders per lane as automobiles, and four or five times as many per hour as buses...

...The Authority alleged perjury, pointing an accusing finger at the auditor of the subcommittee, and accused Celler of clandestine hankypanky...

...Congressman Celler's inquiry let the larger issues go by default, wavering between revanche and trivialities...

...Indeed, Tobin once remarked that "if 34th Street weren't congested, we'd be in trouble...

...Yet even with guaranteed money, the Port Authority moved slowly and, seemingly, a touch reluctantly...

...is a decade old, but it erupted into a pitched hattle only recently...

...Why does the Authority continue to levy high tolls on tunnels and bridges that have been paid for two, three and four times over...

...Since transporting freight is a more profitable business, the railroads are hesitant to improve commuter service...

...While the Port Authority has been eminently successful in funneling a greater number of cars into New York City daily, it has done far less for the commuter railroads which could alleviate much of the city's transportation jam...

...For example, the number of people pouring into Manhattan daily is less than it was a decade ago...

...Along with Traffic Commissioner T. T. Wiley, the Authority seems intent to bury and asphyxiate New Yorkers with more and more cars...

...Unquestionably, the Authority has shown extraordinary talent in managing everything it undertakes, from grain elevators to an animal port at Idlewild ("the first shelter in the United States built exclusively for the care of animal travelers...

...In the eyes of many observers these issues should have been the crux of the subcommittee's investigation...

...Howard S. Cullman, the Authority's honorary chairman, asserted that the Congressman had overstepped the bounds of propriety in using Congressional stationery to petition the Authority in behalf of his law firm's private client...

...Why is there an imbalance in New York City's transportation with motor cars receiving a high priority over trains and buses...

...At present, the case is pending in a Washington Federal court...

...Moreover, there seems little point in bringing the Government into the picture as long as the states have full prerogative...

...As a greater number of cars enter cities, parkways and streets become jammed and impassable...

...By applying some of its revenues to the weaker branches of transportation, the Authority might lower its Dun and Bradstreet rating a notch but improve the general picture...

...Celler's investigation indicates that the Federal Government may step in where the states fear to tread...

...A major metropolitan disease—one common to most large cities from New York to Los Angeles—is hardening of the arteries...

...What is the relationship of the Authority's policies to overall city planning...

...Congress gave it a stamp of endorsement and then proceeded to forget about the organization's existence—until Congressman Celler exploded almost 40 years later...

...Celler, the press was led to believe, was about to unearth malfeasance and peculation galore...

...Thus far a $20 million state appropriation to purchase badly needed railroad cars has been made available to the Authority when it became obvious the Authority itself would not allocate the funds...

...Were the tickets for the Folies Bergère really a business expense...

...that undoubtedly share jurisdiction with the Federal Government in some fashion...

...The more commuter business we get, the more money we lose," noted Alfred E. Perlman, president of the New York Central Railroad...