Here was railroad competition showing its most disagreeable side to the public weal. The man who lived at Martinsburg, West Virginia, or Cumberland, Maryland, or virtually any of the other non-competitive points of the Baltimore and Ohio was to be penalized henceforth in the name of competition. Having enjoyed great comfort and facility under the non-competitive plan of the United States Railroad Administration in the use of the Pennsylvania Station in the heart of Manhattan, he was now to be shoved back into the old station at Communipaw, just below Jersey City, with its slow and cumbersome ferry connections across the Hudson River. It was not likely that he would henceforth become an enthusiast over the competitive system of railroading. The whole thing seemed so absurd that I took it upon myself to mention it in the public prints. That apparently did the trick. Publicity ofttimes does. The Pennsylvania changed its position; in a big and graceful and generous way it waived what apparently were its obvious competitive rights in the situation, and invited both the Baltimore and Ohio and the Lehigh Valley to remain at least for some years to come in its great New York passenger terminal. The invitation was accepted with alacrity. Most of the consolidated ticket-offices still remain, although there is a constant disposition among the more independent of our separate railroads to break away from them. Theoretically offering far better facilities to the traveler than the separate city offices, practically they rarely do this. For one thing, despite their brave show of mahogany and other fine forms of office fittings, they frequently are under-manned, particularly in seasons of heavy travel. And a man in a hurry going to one of them frequently is compelled to wait an outrageously long time. The fact also remains that the so-called weaker lines that use them seem so submerged as hardly to have a fair chance at the competitive traffic. A small railroad can make a large showing with an attractive office in the heart of a big city. Relatively it outshadows its neighbor. Where the individual roads have remained in the consolidated offices up to the present time, it has been largely the result of a laudable desire to stand by their fellows. The Railroad Administration forced some one line in each large city to assume the rental of the consolidated offices. In Chicago, for instance, the ten-year lease (at $65,000 a year) of the consolidated ticket-office fell upon the broad shoulders of the Burlington. With the exception of the Northwestern system, which showed a particular antipathy to the late Railroad Administration, virtually all the large roads have remained with the Burlington.