10 Outlandish Conspiracies That Were Actually True

9. General Motors Destroy Public Transport

In the end, the Watergate conspiracy was destructive only to Nixon's political career, as he was swiftly impeached and discredited. If you want some real, lasting effects from a conspiracy, you need to look into the commercial sector.

General Motors is still being fingered as part of conspiracy theories today, albeit as a victim. The 2006 documentary Who Killed The Electric Car? suggests that GM's prototype vehicle - with zero emissions or need for petrol - was quashed by a lobby of big oil companies and the US government itself. Back in the day, though, it was General Motors themselves who were behind the dodgy dealings. And they're confirmed, too.

Do you ever wonder why San Francisco is the only major American city to have adopted trams, and keeps them running to this day, whilst everywhere else has to contend with grubby buses or subways for public transport? Well, that's GM's fault. Between 1936 and 1950, the company joined up with a bunch of other burgeoning automobile manufacturers to form National City Lines and Pacific City Lines. The express purpose of that company? To buy up all the streetcars in the country and junk them, so people would keep buying cars to travel in instead.

During those two decades National City Lines and Pacific City Lines took control of over 100 tramlines in LA, New York and San Diego, replacing them instead with bus routes. You know, public transport that was powered by automobile engines, not electricity. If this all sounds familiar, that's because it's the plot of Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, and if you're shocked that there's even a note of realism in that film, well, you're not the only one. So there you go: big auto killed public transport in America by buying it all and junking it all.