"Our own investigations make us absolutely certain that if the public understands the true situation, it will not be misled by the specious arguments of the United Railroads. The conduit electric system, despite what the United Railroads and its representatives may say, is practicable, safe, efficient and superior to an overhead trolley. We are further satisfied that the company is seeking, by an offer of $200,000 which they offer to the people, to save itself an expense of several million dollars, which the conduit electric system would cost, if it should be required to reconstruct all its lines using the conduits; but we believe--and we are certain that the citizens of San Francisco will agree with us in this--that since the United Railroads, through the watering of its stock, has already made many millions of dollars out of its properties, and is now taking, and will take many millions of profits from our people, that it can afford to contribute to San Francisco the cost of the most attractive and efficient system of electric railroads. The United Railroads has put forward many arguments which have been and are easily met: "First: It contended, as the public will remember, that the conduit electric system was impracticable on account of the accumulation of rain water in its conduits. This claim it has been forced to abandon. "Second: It proclaimed loudly that the added cost of construction of an electric conduit was such that the life of its franchise would not justify the outlay. Now, they have abandoned this claim, and assert that it is not the cost of construction, but that there are other reasons. "Third: They have declared that a uniform system was desirable. They now admit that a completely uniform system is impracticable, owing to grades, making it necessary to operate some lines by cable. Their only contention now is that the overhead trolley system is more efficient than either the cable or conduit electric system. "Mr. C. E. Grunsky is our authority for the statement that in making the change from the conduit electric to the trolley, in passing from city to suburbs, there are no objectionable features, nor danger. Sir Alex. B. W. Kennedy, consulting engineer to the London County Council, in recommending the adoption of the conduit electric system for London's municipal street railways, said: 'There is no difficulty in arranging the cars so that they can be run from the underground (conduit) to the overhead and vice versa, either with no stoppage at all at the point of change, or with a stopping of only a few seconds. There is no engineering difficulty whatever in using a mixed tramway system, i.e., partly underground (conduit) and partly overhead.'