Are Bound To Have A Road

Ypsilanti People Are Earnest About Milan Line

SAYS MAYOR HUSTON

Will Commence Work Right Away -- Farmers in that Section Would Rather Go to Greek City

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"Well, I see the parties who are concerned in the building of the new electric railway from Toledo to Ann Arbor were in the city Wednesday and that they are going to give Ypsilanti the go-by," said Mayor Huston, of Ypsilanti, to the Argus Wednesday. 

"Yes, there were three automobile loads of them," said the reporter, "and they say it is definitely determined to come directly to Ann Arbor and that they will enter the city on State street."

"Why do they propose to cut Ypsilanti out of the reckoning?" asked his honor.

"Well," replied the reporter, "one of the gentlemen prominently interested gave as a reason that when they went to eastern capitalists for the velvet they said, 'We don't know anything about Ypsilanti, but we do know a lot about Ann Arbor, and we have no money to invest in the proposed line to Ypsilanti.' This fact became an insurmountable obstacle and the idea of building to Ypsilanti had to be abandoned, for an electric railway cannot be built without money, you know." 

"But Ypsilanti does not propose to be sidetracked in any such dead easy manner," replied Mayor Huston. 

"What do you propose to do [about] it?" asked the scribe. 

"We propose to build a road from Ypsilanti to Milan and have it completed before the other push get to Milan with their line and then with our road already built if they think it will pay to build a line direct to Ann Arbor, that is their privilege. Much of the trade of that section through which a line from Ypsilanti will run belongs to the Greek City and we propose to keep it. A direct line to Ann Arbor is welcome to all it can pick up through the region it will tap. We propose to get about this business right away. You remember how the county hub was going to have the Saline electric road. Well, Ann Arbor got that in the same way she will get the Milan division of the Toledo road. 

"We propose to start in at once and get a move on our Business Men's association and get our  road started. We can probably get the Hawks-Angus line to take it off our hands as soon as it is ready to operate, the same as we did the Saline line. A line from Milan to Ypsilanti would pay from the start. During the school year there will be enough Normal college students from that section [to] to make a carload a day each way. And the farmers of that route are among the most prosperous of [the] county and they move about and they will patronize such a line extensively -- more than any direct line to Ann Arbor. 

"No, don't you think for a minute that Ypsilanti will permit that road to go by on the other side. We propose to have it and will have it," and his honor walked on fiercely chewing the end of a cigar as though he were in dead earnest.