Our website has been down for more than two weeks after being hacked by
SFMSR
Formerly ‘Uncategorized’ which is a default term for Stories, and may be left checked even when a post is assigned categories. The Slug is generic & meaningless but it looks better when the public views articles.
Call for 2012 Calendar Photos
As many who read this site know well, Market Street Railway is a member supported non-profit organization and the streetcar and cable car preservation partner of the San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni). We receive no government funding and depend on membership dues, donations, and proceeds from sales of our merchandise to support our preservation and transit advocacy.
Going Out With Style on California Street
Muni is shutting down the California Street cable car line for an estimated six months starting in January, to replace a variety of mechanical components under the street and do some track work. They’ll apply lessons learned to try to make the next phases — covering the two Powell Street lines — go faster. Makes sense, since the Cal line has very low ridership compared to the Powell lines.
Thanks to cable car gripman (and Market Street Railway member) Val Lupiz, the Cal cable line is getting a spectacular sendoff. With the help of his financee and her daughters, he decorated Cal cable car No. 60 (the newest in the Cal fleet) for the holidays — and what a job they did! Enjoy Val’s photos…or better yet, take a ride on the car before the Cal line goes on hiatus. What could be a more San Francisco holiday trip — and of course, on California Street, no waiting in long lines (for passengers, that is — for the cars themselves at the Market Street end of the line, wellllll…..
A Salute to the China Clipper!
There’s a case to be made that 75 years ago, San Francisco was the most interesting transportation venue in the world, however briefly. For it was three-quarters of a century ago today that the first Martin Flying Boat took off from San Francisco Bay, bound for Manila (photo, left, from Associated Press). That seaplane was named the China Clipper by its owner, Pan American Airways, a name that the public applied to every other Pan Am plane that joined it on the route. Our friend Carl Nolte tells the story wonderfully in today’s Chronicle. Nolte notes that the pilot on that first flight flew under the cables of the unfinished Bay Bridge on his takeoff. He would also have flown over numerous ferries still providing the only way to get directly between the City, the East Bay, and Marin. That made the Ferry Building one of the busiest transit terminals in the world, served by more than 800 streetcars in the afternoon peak period. (What? You didn’t think we would leave streetcars out, however tenuous the connection, did you?)When you consider that this first China Clipper flight came just eight years after Lindbergh’s New York to Paris flight, seen as a revolution in aviation, it is a stunning testimony to the speed at which technology developed, as well as a tribute to the guts of Pan Am for inaugurating what was a risky, but visionary, service. Though almost no San Franciscan could afford a trans-Pacific flight, which was priced at almost $30,000 round trip in today’s dollars, all appreciated that it cemented their city’s role as the undisputed commercial capital of the West Coast (for at least a little while longer).Personal note: when I was growing up in my family’s delicatessen on Market Street (“Laubscher Brothers: Famous for Fine Salads”), my great uncle, Carl Laubscher, would tell me that early in the China Clipper era, Pan Am came to him and his brothers and asked if they would supply box lunches for the passengers on the first leg of the flight. He said they turned it down, thus missing a chance to get in on the ground floor of what became the airline catering business. Thanks, Unc!
It’s Here! MSR’s 2011 Museums In Motion Calendar
Just in time for, well, next year, Market Street Railway is proud to unveil the 2011 edition of our Museums In Motion calendar. Printed in a large, 16 x 11 inch format, the 2011 Museums In Motion Calendar features thirteen
7 Come 11
Lucky in craps, lucky in streetcars. The two yellow Milan trams (1807 and 1811) luckily showed up back to back on the service pits at Geneva Division the other night as a camera wandered past. It’s a tribute to Carole Gilbert and her Muni paint crew that 1811, painted some time ago, looks as fresh as the freshly painted 1807, which just reentered service following two years of accident repairs.
Inside the Mint!
For a quarter-century, Market Street Railway has shared the space at Duboce Avenue and Buchanan and Market Streets with Muni, using it to restore streetcars for the F-line. Looming above all the while, the formidable U.S. Mint. In fact, its original entrance, at 350 Duboce Avenue, sits inside our facility, though it was sealed off before the street was closed and turned into a Muni right-of-way in the 1970s.We’ve seen the outside a thousand times, but never the inside — until now, thanks to this great essay by Andrew Dudley at Haighteration. Check it out.
Volunteers Urgently Needed (Sunday 10/3)
City Guides Streetcar History Tour (Oct 31)
Market Street Railway and San Francisco City Guides are collaborating on a memorable and unique tour along Muni’s historic F-line on Sunday, October 31st. Take part in a festive and informative trip through history!
Castro Street Fair Volunteers Needed (Sunday 10/3)
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