Streetcar companies were universally reviled (as most effective monopolies tend to be, like US cable or power companies), and their status quo actually was wors

Streetcar companies were universally reviled (as most effective monopolies tend to be, like US cable or power companies), and their status quo actually was worse than what was being introduced for cars, because they pretty much all had flat price caps and were expected to pay maintenance for city streets they operated on. It also doesn't help that a fair amount of streetcars were just land speculation plays (let's sell all this land that's newly accessible!). When they needed full replacement and renewal, they no longer had anything to finance it with.