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In Surabaya the Surabaya Electric Tram Co. maintains a highly 
efficient tram service to all parts of the town. One branch of the 
company’s track connects the harbor with the town, a distance of 
about 5 miles. The equipment and rolling stock of the Surabaya 
company is of European manufacture and is thoroughly up-to-date 
and efficient. 
LIGHTING 
HOME LIGHTING 
Until a few years ago, homes in the Netherland East Indies were 
very poorly illuminated because of the high rates charged for current 
for lamps of high wattage. During the last few years, however, there 
has been a tendency on the part of the power companies to make 
their rates lower. An increase in the demand for lighting facilities 
in the homes has been the result. Cheap German fixtures are used 
in lighting the native homes, while the wealthier class is furnished with 
fixtures of conventional Dutch design. 
Verandas of all European and some of the better-class native homes 
are lighted by large standing lamps, which are used more commonly 
than overhead lights because insects are atiracted to the lights. The 
veranda lamps are usually covered with elaborate silk lamp shades, 
which are made and sold very cheaply in Java. The lamps also are 
made locally, of reed or teak or some other tropical wood. The 
latter are often beautifully carved by Chinese woodworkers. 
New homes intended for Europeans are now being equipped with 
modern interior lighting fixtures, but in the past the fixtures that were 
installed were of cheap and antiquated design. In the homes of the 
wealthy, however, elaborate glass chandeliers are found. This type 
of fixture is also popular with the better-class natives. 
The types of fixtures found in living and dining rooms are varied. 
Single lamps, as well as highly decorated chandeliers of metal, sus- 
pended from the ceiling either by rods or chains, are used. 
American manufacturers of home lighting fixtures will find it ex- 
tremely difficult to persuade electrical firms in Java to handle their 
lines, since the European goods are so firmly intrenched on the local 
market and so far below the American products in price that few 
importers would even try to introduce a new line. 
STREET LIGHTING 
The progress in street lighting has not kept pace with other devel- 
opments in the use of electric power. The streets of the most im- 
portant cities in the territory are poorly illuminated, and in many 
small towns and villages there are no street lights of any description. 
An American company, which has been endeavoring to introduce its 
street lighting reflectors into Java for the last five years, has finally 
succeeded in interesting one of the large municipalities. This was 
done, however, only after tests over a period of several years were 
made with the reflectors. 
A branch office of a German manufacturer secures most of the 
business in steel poles which support the electric wires used in convey- 
ing the current used in street lighting. American poles were used by 
the Government several years ago, but the climate had a deleterious 
effect on them; they soon corroded and had to be replaced. In the 
small towns street lights are suspended from wires strung between 
the trees that line the roadsides.