Andrew Carnegie will probably be called on Friday.
If there is any general opposition to an ordinance to guard the public against the nuisance of smoking automobiles, it failed to develop at a public hearing in the matter held yesterday afternoon by the Committee on Laws and Legislation of the Board of Aldermen. One man appeared when opponents of the bill were asked to express their views, but he admitted that the ordinance would be a good thing if operative only in Manhattan.
He was Herbert G. Andrews, of the Committee on Laws and Legislation of the Long Island Automobile Club. He said the club favored the abatement of the nuisance, but would like to have the ordinance altered in certain respects.
In the form introduced by Alderman Nicoll the ordinance is identically the same as one now in force prohibiting smoking automobiles in the parks. It says that “no person shall run a motor vehicle in the streets and highways of the city of New York which emits from the exhaust or muffler thereof offensive quantities of smoke, gas or disagreeable odors,” and that “any violation of the provisions of this ordinance shall be deemed a minor offence and, upon conviction thereof before a city magistrate, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $10 or by imprisonment in the City Prison, or by both; but no such imprisonment, however, shall exceed a term of five days.”
Mr. Andrews suggested that the word “offensive” be changed to “excessive” and that the fine be graduated--slight for the first offence and heavier for subsequent offences.
William H. Palmer, of the New York Transportation Company, a taxicab concern, said that it would be easier to determine the offence if the ordinance made some reference to the distance at which smoke extending from an automobile was unlawful.
In support of the bill there appeared many persons, including two women. Alderman Nicoll said that smoking automobiles were the cause of a great blue haze often to be found at places such as Columbus Circle and Forty-second street and Fifth avenue. The smoke penetrated stores, he said, and made it necessary for merchants to keep their doors and windows closed to protect their goods.
The alderman told of riding in a taxicab from Cortlandt street to Fiftieth street on Thursday afternoon and of passing one hundred and sixty-four automobiles, of which, he said, thirty were smoking.