A corporation may be organized to construct, acquire, maintain, or operate internal improvements, including railways, street railways, telegraph and telephone lines, canals, slackwater, or other navigation, dams to create or improve a water supply or to furnish power for public use, and any work for supplying the public, by whatever means, with water, light, heat, or power, including all requisite subways, pipes, and other conduits, and tunnels for transportation of pedestrians. No corporation formed for these purposes may construct, maintain, or operate a railway of any kind, or a subway, pipe line, or other conduit, or a tunnel for transportation of pedestrians in or upon a street, alley, or other public ground of a city, without first obtaining from the city a franchise conferring this right and compensating the city for it.