Talk about a flashback! I grew up in SF and Daly City in the late '50's and '60's. My mom did drive so we took transit everywhere. I recall many a streetcar ride down Market St and through the Twin Peaks tunnel to West Portal to catch a connecting bus. Lot's of memories for sure! Glad you had a fun adventure :-)
The Cable cars are indeed mainly a tourist thing, but I've heard there's a decent number of locals who use them for regular transportation, since they're included with a monthly pass.
It’s also exactly the same fare as the Muni buses and light rails. This can transfer onto the next ride if there’s enough time. SF Muni also runs the Cable Cars, but the Cable Cars are not included in the regular fare. They cost significantly more and you’ll be lining up for those and crammed.
My dad used to use the cable car to get home from work when he lived in SF in the 90s. Pretty useful to get from the offices downtown to van ness and then onto the busses from there. He would catch it farther down the line away from the crowd on Market
@@dantem4119 I was lucky enough during my earliest years to grow up in an SRO between Chinatown and Russian Hill. If we left early enough in the morning we would board the Cable Car instead of the bus to get to school. (Spring Valley) We'd see the same conductors almost everytime and they were really nice to me and let me ring the bell with the giant sign not to ring it. I also remember loving the smell of it. There was always a pleasant aroma of wood and machine oil, and worn metal. And it was especially nice on a misty morning where I could smell the ocean in the air.
I agree that mostly tourists use the cable cars. However many of the locals use them too. I used to use them since the nearest bus line going East from my apartment. I suggest to buy an All Day Pass early in the morning in visiting San Francisco. It is unlimited rides on all Muni lines, including the cable cars. You can purchase them from the conductor aboard the CC or at the Muni kiosk located at the Powell St. cable car turnaround. I miss seeing the Italian cars that I haven't seen in while. If you board one of them the advertising on board are in Italian
I highly recommend you visit the last weekend in September, which is Muni Heritage Weekend. Pretty much every operational historic streetcar, cable car, trolley bus and diesel coach on Muni’s roster is available to ride for free. Even Muni’s oldest surviving streetcar 578, built in 1896, makes an appearance, along with one or both Blackpool boat trams 😊
I second the thanks for your presentation of San Francisco’s trolley system and the City in a positive light. Too much bad press comes from tourists leaving their luggage in their rental cars parked near Pier 39 or at Twin Peaks, instead of keeping that stuff at the hotel. Note to tourists: DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT LEAVE YOUR STUFF IN THE RENTAL CAR!!! This should be common sense. (Just like when you go to Yosemite or Yellowstone National Park, don’t try to get selfies with bears or bison. That should be common sense!). Getting your passport ripped off when your flight from SFO leaves later that afternoon, is no fun. Easily preventable.
My mom grew up riding the Newark PCCs and she's taken me on the Newark Light Rail, and it is absolutely wild to see Newark PCCs in San Francisco of all places! An interesting fact about the Newark PCCs, is that they weren't originally made for Newark! The Newark City Subway opened in 1935 and was owned by Public Service's Transport of New Jersey subsidiary. However PCCs wouldn't serve the system until 1954. When the Twin City Rapid Transit Company in Minnesota was shutting down operations, they sold thirty of them to Newark in 1953! So really, they're Minneapolis-St Paul PCCs! As these PCCs were single-ended, it required building a loop at Franklin Ave, a loop that no longer exists. When NJ Transit was formed in 1979 and took over the Newark City Subway in 1980, the PCCs ended up in NJ Transit colors, and their NJ Transit forms looked really cool, cool enough I got a Corgi model of it! These PCCs served Newark from 1954 all the way until 2001 when they were replaced by Kinki-Sharyo LRVs. When they were retired, they sold eleven of them, specifically the cars labelled 1070 to 1080, to San Francisco! So Car 1073/El Paso, 1080/Los Angeles, 1074/Toronto, and 1072/Mexico City you saw are Newark ones!
Those Twin Cities cars really did get around! Having recently ridden both the River Line and HBLR, the Newark subway is next on my list. Maybe we can do it together someday next year :)
What a great time both of you seem to be having in this video. Always smiling, and enjoying rides on the colorful San Francisco trolleys. The video is perfectly balanced between an informative history lecture and having fun. Trolleys, Lindsey cameos, and bonus sea lion footage. Here’s wishing both of you a happy Thanksgiving Day.
As a SF resident of 35 years, it's refreshing to see a positive perspective on our city. Thank you! The only thing I might of included in your report is that the F line begins (or ends) in the Castro, our famous LGBTQ neighborhood.
I recall riding these trolleys (streetcars) as a kid back in the 1970s. They were worn out in the 1970s and they were used across the city before being replaced with newer trolley (light rail) cars.
@@Thom-TRA - Do you mean Muni? Yeah, the Muni rail network is larger now, than it was in the 1970s, and the newer light rail cars are quieter than the old street cars. You should check out the Muni Chinatown station.
Suprised to hear that some PCCs were from Newark, NJ. I used to ride those in high school. Now I live in SF and can ride them. But I haven't seen their livery on the F cars. I don't ride often, so it's possible I have been missing them.
The NYC one you saw, Car 1053 originally from SEPTA, is specifically meant to honor the Brooklyn & Queens Transit Corporation! Streetcars ran in Brooklyn from 1936 to 1956. Trolleys were once such a part of the Brooklyn scene that the local baseball club was named the Brooklyn Trolley Dodgers, which of course was shortened to the Brooklyn Dodgers! The Dodgers were called such because they had to dodge the heavy construction of trolley tracks to reach the park. Brooklyn once having a streetcar system is even referenced in Pokémon Black/White in Nacrene City! BQ&T played a role in the development of the PCC. BQ&T was the first to test a PCC prototype, and joined Pittsburgh and Chicago as the first to operate production PCCs in late 1936. In 1940, the New York City Board of Transportation took over B&QT, but no additional PCCs ever joined the Brooklyn fleet, and as the NYC government preferred buses, the streetcars ended on Halloween in 1956, coincidentally a year before the Dodgers team left Brooklyn.
I rode the E line when I visited the city. The line riding was such a great enjoyment for me, but at the same time it made me some kind of sad, because it reminded me that these vehicles came from some lines which were REMOVED...
I remember riding the El Paso/Juarez streetcars as a really little kid. One of my earliest memories. They connected the downtown areas of both cities. It must have been the late 1960s. I grew up in Southern California, but my mother was from the El Paso, Juarez area. We were visiting and we took it from Ciudad Juarez to downtown El Paso for a day of shopping.
@@Thom-TRA It really wasn't. Even when I was a kid in the 70s, it was like one huge bi-national city. Border crossing were no big deal. As a US citizen, you could cross back into the US, just by declaring yourself a "US citizen."
Seeing these PCC streetcars, San Francisco bought a large fleet of them and repainted them to represent other cities that has bought PCC streetcars. I love it seeing you younger people taking part in this because sometimes there may be some schools who may be wanting to learn the history of public transit. I am 62 and the last streetcar line in St. Louis closed in 1966. That was the Hodiamont line. Many other cities closed all of their streetcar lines by the early 1950s. My father rode the streetcar to school which was the Manchester line and he changed to the City Limits. The Manchester streetcar line were numbered 53 thru 56. 53 went to Maplewood and stopped. 54 went into Webster Groves and stopped at Lockwood and Rock Hill. 55 went to Clay and Adams and 56 was the longest out of all of those numbers as it terminated at Woodbine and Magnolia. My mother rode the Grand Avenue streetcar to school. My first ride on public transit was on a bus and the bus was a Flxible Suburban. It worked the 57 Manchester. I remember the shakey starts when the bus would start from a stop.
These streetcars are each so unique and it’s so awesome that they have been preserved and are being ridden. Really enjoyed this video, especially the Italian restaurant scene where you could enjoy awesome food and awesome transit!!! Awesome!!!
The turnaround in Castro district is also quite cool! It has seating and planters/art used as bollards to keep cars away. The only section really used by locals is the Embarcadero portion because the Market St portion is like 10x quicker to use Muni Metro/BART.
I don’t know, I saw more commuters on the Market Street section and more tourists on the Embarcadero section. Probably because there are more stops than Metro.
@@Thom-TRA I always think of Embarcadero as the stop for the amatuers. It the one that most people are familiar with . I noticed you passed the Muni rail and streetcar museum. Did you stop in? Props for going out to Musee Mecanique! The best first date that many here don't know about
Glad you both had so much fun riding them My only trip here was in 2005 and alas I did not have time to ride the streetcars so another trip is required at some point. It kind of reminds me of the Blackpool trams before the big modernisation. Glad the sea lions are still there.
Nice video on the historic streetcars in SF. Did you make it to the Market Street Railway Museum? I've never gone but always wanted to. They show on their web site to view some of the other historic streetcars with the open air streetcar my favorite (Blackpool No 228) and I think I've only seen it once in operations (needs good weather to put it in service).
Hey Thom recent viewer and first time commenting here. I visited in September to coincide with the annual Streetcar Festival. There you’ll see some of the additional cars in the fleet. The Blackpool trams was the STAR of the festival people waiting for an hour to board it. Also since the yard is deeper to the south you’re allowed to ride it as it heads north which is great getting photos from Dolores Park. The staff is very friendly especially if you meet Joe on the Cable Cars. Happy Riding!
I love those streetcars (or trams, however you call them). In fact, I’ve been volunteering at that railway museum (free admission, btw) about 5 or 6 years now (less so nowadays due to school-related activities), and it’s a volunteer job I will never stop doing.
Aw I miss these! I rode these streetcars for the first time when I last went to SF several years ago, and when we were riding one of the former Milan streetcars, my grandpa said he used to ride one like that in Seoul back in the day. I wish I could've told him about how much I enjoy taking transit, so that's a little memory I'm always savoring. If/when I ever go back, riding the F Market and Wharves is going to be the first thing I do, in his memory. 😭
Definitely, the cable cars and F Line are not just for tourists. Friends of mine living in the city ride them all the time. When I lived down there, I did the same.
FYI - In the early50's when cars replaced streetcars, streetcars for Minnapolis/St. Paul Transit were sold to Mexico. I wonder if any then went on from Mexico to San Francisco. because the streetcar you show in San Francisco from Mexico is painted the colors that Twin Cities buses were painted up until the 60's.
I don’t think I remember any SF cars coming directly from Mexico, but these PCCs have definitely been part of a global shuffle, so it is always a possibility!
I have been on the Melbourne tram and one of them is a free route around the inner city centre.I didn't realize that one of their cars is in San Francisco .
The F-line stops on my corner. Castro Station is only a block further away, but the streetcars make local stops between the subway stations where they overlap. It's fun for tourists and locals alike, but it's also the most convenient way for me to bring home groceries and dog food. As a local, with a cute dog service dog who likes making friends, I enjoy meeting tourists and answering some of their questions.
Toronto had one of the biggest PCC fleets and sold the majority of them to Alexandria Egypt... there is also a Toronto Transit Commision (TTC) PCC in Kenosha Wisc. you rode it in one of your past videos Great video Thom Tim in Toronto...
As a rail fan from Boston with a fondness of PCCs, I'm so glad San Francisco keeps them in service. As you know, Boston also maintains PCCs for its Mattapan-Ashmont run - a line which I rode many times in my youth. I also spent a while in San Francisco (I worked on Market Steet) in the early days of BART. Another good video! Thanks.
Hi Thom... There was one PCC with so called NYC livery but in fact it was Brooklyn that had PCC's and car #1000 had standee windows while the rest didn't... The car shown in your video had standee windows... That trip looked like so much fun... I'm looking forward to the subsequent videos...😊
@Thom-TRA Brooklyn is a borough of NYC, but my point was that Brooklyn exclusively operated PCC's and not the other boroughs... Also, after the PCC's, they exclusively ran trolley buses from 1956-1960 just as the GM New Look "Fishbowls" began their run... In the old days, Brooklyn was the place to be...😄
Nice video for someone who is thinking about visiting San Francisco. And San Franciscans use the F Line al the time for local transportation. . The F Line was an afterthought. It was not in the original plan. Someone came up with the bright idea to retain the tracks and recondition the PCC's and get more from various other cities. They are much loved. Much nicer than the soulless MUNI underground.
Same, I love the Milan car best, even though it's the loudest and I have to pause my music while I'm riding it. That button near the door to request a stop is the coolest, no idea why. Back when I had a monthly Muni pass, if I saw that thing coming and I didn't have to be somewhere immediately, I'd hop on for no reason.
The Streetcars are great! I grew up in the Sunset district, which is served, from downtown-to-the-ocean, bye the "N Judah," and the "L Taraval," cars. As kids, the "N car," was our transit to the "Irving Theater," where we spent much of Saturday afternoon ... and, to the ice-skating rink, very near the end-of-the-line, at the beach. Now, I live on the other side of Golden Gate Pare, in the Richmond district. I often drive to my old stomping-grounds, to park, and ride the "N car," downtown, just for the memories.
I love it! Good move eating Italian in North Beach while visiting. World class. I enjoyed the privilege of living in the city for 14 years, starting right after the '89 earthquake. Along with the F Market, locals also road the California Street cable car line a lot. It was one of the most fun ways to get from downtown to the Polk neighborhood (and they used to accept our monthly MUNI passes with no extra charge in those days). There's a lot of beautiful stuff to this day in San Francisco. Looking forward to the rest of your SF and California series! So glad you enjoyed your stay!
I visited SF in late 2021 and stayed in FiDi near the Embarcadero and the ferry building. those trolleys were so cool but I don't remember ever needing to take them. The Toronto livery I recognized I think but what an awesome way to preserve history and provide useful transportation. I still loved the cable car so much I took it twice!! I also took a ferry to the USS Hornet in Alameda. I love ferries as part of public transportation.
I’ve been to San Francisco a few times and saw these street cars, but unfortunately didn’t ride them. However, we do use PCC cars on the Mattapan-Ashmont High Speed Line in Boston.
I'm glad you got to see the Musée Mécanique! One of my favorite attractions in SF. If you haven't already done so, if you're in SF again, I highly recommend the Exploratorium, which is on Pier 15, about halfway between the Ferry Building and Fisherman's Warf.
Thank you so much for this wonderful video! It was very nice to see the sights of the city, delicious food and of course the sea lions. I love PCC trams, but I have never ridden them, I’ve watched a lot of videos and read documents about these cars. In my native city we had “relatives” of the PCC trams - the Tatra T3, it is also a legend of tram industry. Tatras are famous for reliability and acceleration dynamics, like the PCC, but the passenger interior is less comfortable. Tram from Moscow is also very interesting one... it was build in 1922 and worked in Moscow until 1950, then it was transferred in Orel. After that it worked as a passenger car from 1950 to 1966 and as a service car from 1966 to 1982. In 1983 it became a monument and stood near the Orel tram depot until 1985, when it was reconstructed and sent to San-Francisco in 1986. Where it worked with passengers until 1994. But the lack of specialists and spare parts made the car a monument for the second time... My friends (tram drivers) and Me (we are from Moscow) tried, as well as several other groups of enthusiasts from Russia tried to help our American colleagues repair this tramcar and we all received some requests from San Francisco with MUNI staff needs. But because of the bureaucracy inside Russia, and then because of the damned and terrible war, we were unable to help... I sincerely want there to be a friendship and love between people all over the world and tram lines F and E could be serviced by trams from different parts of the world. An interesting fact is that the tram model from Russia is "Ф" ("F"), just the same as the line name.
Fun fact: Muni used the PCC cars as their primary streetcar and metro until 1980. The first fleet of LRV's (aka: trams) on Muni was the Boeing LRV which was phased in about 1977, and became the primary streetcar fleet by 1980. So the PCC's had only been off the streets for about 15 years before Muni introduced the F line, which is why the locals easily embraced them as daily transportation. One of the Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry movies from the 1970's shows the PCC cars running in the dowtown metro. F-Market runs mostly PCC's on weekdays. If you want to experience the other streetcars like Milan or Porto, come on the weekends, major holidays, or during the annual trolley festival. Note that one-way the entire 6 mile F-Line from Castro Street to Pier 39 is about a 30 minute trip (though along the way there are stops every 2 or 3 blocks). That's an average of about 5mph, which is slower than the other streetcar AND cable car lines combined average of 9 mph.
Damn this brings back memories. Born and raised in SF and when I was a teen I used to ride the KT muni (formally just the K) from my house on ocean ave to embarcadero and then take the F just to get to in n out haha. I didnt even realize how cool it was because it was just my normal. Thanks for sharing these videos.
I also remember when I used to take the muni it cost 35 cents which was great because I always had a quarter and a dime. And then they increased it to 50 cents and I was so mad because that meant I had to use two quarters lol
Bart didn't technically "tunnel" under Market street. The entire street was dug up, the two rail systems where built in on top of each other, and then the street was reconstructed. Also, even though they are slow and crowded, locals use the cable cars to get to Nob Hill and Russian Hill and get a free ride with a monthly fast pass clipper card. At least everytime I bring out my clipper card for the ticket taker, they just wave it off. It's probably the same fare as regular MUNI. Perhaps they're just happy a native is using it. It is convenient and picturesque way to get across downtown to Chinatown, North Beach, Russian Hill or if you're out by Aquatic Park.
San Diego has a cool Vintage Streetcar line (not to be confused with the San Diego MTS Trolley) called the Silver Line that loops downtown (i think it only runs on select weekends) but its pretty cool. You should do a vid on San Diego's public transit and maybe take the Surfliner there while you're at it
a big thank you for sharing your very nice impressions of the F Line. The PPC cars are my favourite and I always look for heritage days in Den Haag (Netherlands) because of their big PCC fleet retired but often in heritage service. 🚋
The sea lions there are California sea lions, ranging from southeastern Alaska to the Gulf of California in Mexico. The sea lions at Pier 39 have been hanging out at Pier 39 since 1989! They used to hang out at Seal Rock but have since moved to Pier 39, some say because they feel safer inside the Bay. When the docks were refurbished in 1989, this temporarily removed boats from the area, and left a lot of room for the sea lions. When the boat owners returned, they complained about navigating because of the sea lions, and thus it was decided to move the boats elsewhere so the sea lions could stay. For those who don't know, seals belong to the family Phocidae, while sea lions belong to the family Otariidae. The differences between seals and sea lions are that sea lions are loud, brown, have ear flaps, and have big flippers to move on land while seals are rounder, seals have ear holes rather than ear flaps, and have small flippers! To propel themselves through water, seals use their powerful hind flippers, fanning them out and moving them in a side-to-side motion. For sea lions, it’s just the opposite by using their large front flippers for swimming and their back flippers for steering, reaching speeds of up to 25 miles per hour.
I love the F line! I enjoy the sunshine along the Embarcadero and visiting the Ferry Building at the foot of Market Street. The sea lions are fun, too. Did you know the ones in San Francisco are all male? The females all winter in Southern California, and then once a year, both groups come together around Santa Barbara for mating season. San Francisco's sea lions used to live at the Cliff House, out where Geary Street reaches the Pacific Ocean. But then they tore down the old Cliff House (you can see pictures of it--the huge Victorian building that looks like it's balanced precariously on a rock). While it was closed, they stopped feeding the sea lions, so the sea lions moved on, looking for a new food source. They found it at Pier 39. By the way, did you notice all the vacant storefronts along Market Street, especially around Powell Street (the cable car turnaround)? It's so sad! Homeless people have taken over the area, driving most of the businesses out of business. At that corner alone, there used to be a Woolworth's dime store, and across the street, a high rise shopping center anchored by the flagship Emporium department store, which later became a Nordstrom's. Both of these had direct underground entrances to the Muni Metro and BART stations there. I'm really looking forward to your video about the Central Subway (which I haven't ridden yet). I hope you made it all the way to Chinatown station. Can't wait to see!
Before the pandemic, the daily ridership of the F-line was approximately that of the entire VTA light rail system in Santa Clara county. Even now, the daily ridership for the F and the entire VTA remains about the same. The Italian cars from Milan are terribly noisy, not so much fun when they're being put in service via the J-line which passes by near my apartment. It used to be that these cars were primarily maintained by volunteers, but I don't know if that's still the case.
Ever see a sea lion riding the Muni? They get a reduced fare. Do you know how much they pay to ride? Half! Half! Half! They're even ruder when they want to get off the bus or streetcar. They stand by the door and scream "Out! Out! Out!" Come to think of it, there are some human passengers who do that too.
Another great video. You left out Minneapolis! It was the first owner of the Newark cars, for six years before the twin cities fell for the automobile and sprawled to rival Los Angeles. Thus, several of the cars actually wear liveries they wore back in 1948 (or 1952 for the Minneapolis cars): The green/cream/red stripe Philly car is in its original colors (the Philly crème cheese was on a 1930s version); the bright yellow and dark green is the first livery worn by the Minneapolis cars, and the rather depressing gray/white/blue with “red shoes” is the color that same car wore when it was first shipped to Newark. Then there are the double-enders, all of which ran in SF; these cars stand out for their huge size, and in fact it was SF’s order of the original of these cars (now only in a museum) that became the prototype for all double ended orders St Louis car company made. Two of them are in their original green and white “wings” livery, but single ended 1040 has it’s own significance: It is the last PCC made in the US and sold new to SF in 1952. Hence it is the only PCC with it’s original interior colors (two tone green and cream, instead of the simplified green and cream of the rest of the fleet) and it has the odd “conductors” seat facing the back door as idiotic make-work labor laws of the mid century (in SF and LA) required two man crews, even in streetcars designed specifically for one. The Philly cars have changed though; today they operate with a modern, replica power system based on the Minnesota/Newark cars; it’s smoother, as anyone who rode the Philly cars toward the end of their first SF life will attest, there was some pretty violet movement when they started up or stoped, towards the end. And, the LA streetcar you showed, in light orange/green and white is one of two in the fleet representing the hated National City Lines, the one owned by big oil/big rubber/big auto that gets all the credit for destroying America’s streetcar lines, which is entirely more credit than it deserves. But, that color was used nationwide, so when Rosa Parks refused to move to the rear of the bus, in Montgomery, that was the color of the bus, not the dark green/white/red of the car painted in Montgomery colors. Sadly, while SF’S F success inspired Milan to open the M line of all Peter Witt Milan trams, in the three liveries used, SF no longer operates any of those cars in regular F line service and only a few look like they’ll likely run again as parts are impossible to find. But, we still have two boat cars and one got a gorgeous red and white paint scheme. September is usually Muni heritage day, when some of the oldest cars come out and that’s the best time to ride those. Otherwise, most of the historic fleet rarely sees regular service these days. The Porto car you mentioned is in pieces; Moscow is buried in decades of dust. There are two New Orleans cars, but one seems to be deigned to live under a tarp. And, there are a few historic buses that come out for heritage day too. Just don’t sit at the back of the gas powered orange and black White bus: The fumes will make you sick before you get to the end of the ride (and for that matter, beware riding 1040 on a warm day, the windows only open 2” these days, the car becomes an oven!
On warm sunny days, they bring out the streetcar from Blackpool (?) in England. It is topless and looks like a boat with streamers of pendent flags from stern to bow. The horn sounds like a toy boat too. If your lucky enough to see it out, jump on in. The passengers riding it are always giddy with excitement. And rightfully so. It's adorable and fun.
Thank you Thom for the video! It looks like you and Lindsey had a great time in San Francisco! I'm hoping to visit the city one day myself! I've been enjoying your latest videos and am looking forward to the next one about Muni🙂
They are truly San Francisco’s iconic mode of transportation. I rode the the ‘Streetcars’ everyday to school in the 60’s & 70’s as a kid. Car tickets back then were 50 cents for 10 rides.
Glad you got a chance to ride the F line and it wasn't crowded. When we did it back in 2008 it was packed and we rode a Peter Witt. Also good to see the PCC cars in the old LA fruit salad and yellow schemes. Those were slightly before my time but have great memories of riding the LAMTA PCC's just before they ended service in 1963.
I get how you could feel that way about Lake Shore drive, though Aliotta Haynes Jeremiah felt differently and I still see it as something Chicago needs.
Mexico City's PCCs had additional doors on the left side of the car. This was because some streets had wide medians, with flowers, sidewalks, and grass. On those streets, the streetcars used the left-side doors and you boarded from the median.
Simply loved the sea lion supplement at the end. Great that you mentioned my home city of Melbourne in the list of cities from which the historic streetcar (tram) fleet comes from. We still have some of our historic cars running a city circuit tour and several are in Victorian Provincial Cities of Ballarat and Bendigo, as well as in Sydney (and, I think, Adelaide and Brisbane at their tramway museums). Cheers again from Michael.🙂🙂🙂
Nicely done. I ride those every few weeks when I don't feel like walking to work on the cruise pier, pier 27. I like the trams from Milan the best and I've seen the very same cars still running in Milan.
Dear San Francisco, please keep all your trolley, streetcars and cable cars on the street. You proved to the ( U.S.) and the world your sensibilities ahead of your time.Please extend more lines and revive downtown and suburb communities. Community life,connections and vibrant urban lives beats boredom , addiction and purposeless lives.
Not sure if it is still true, but the streetcar fare used to covered a four hour transfer window, which allowed you to head from Market/SoMa/Castro up to Fisherman's Wharf, grab a quick bite and go back home all for one fare.
Living in Manchester U.K. 21 years, the Metrolink Trams here compare well to the LUAS trams in Dublin in my native Ireland and on recent visits home, I have been most impressed by improvements made to the DART trains in Dublin - there is talk about a Metro System being planned for Dublin as well as a DART Underground, but whether or not the Irish Government secures funding for this is another matter, even if via private investment - I’m also hearing that despite the failur of HS2 here in the U.K. and the failure of the high speed rail tunnel project between Holyhead and Dublin, the Welsh Government appear to be pushing ahead with plans for electrification of the North Wales line
Muni used to run the Peter Witt Milan cars on a regular basis, but has stopped and almost exclusively run the PCCs; I say almost because in certain cases, they have to run buses. I liked the Peter Witt cars because it had better standing capacity, although the city didn't like running it in the evenings because of how loud it runs. It's great to ride on the weekdays, but can be horror on weekends when the vehicles reach capacity and is forced to skip stops where passengers are waiting to embark. As for speed, it's a long ride if one takes it from end to end, this is when Muni Metro helps to get between Castro and Embarcadero a lot quicker.
my dad was a foreman and later was promoted to maintenance manager for muni buses and trams and growing up I would spend time in the summer at the maintenance facility and see all the buses and trams in bits. My dad could give a 5 hour lecture about the maintenance history of any muni vehicle in the early 00's. Sadly a jackstand failed and one of these streetcars fell on his hand and he was in a lot of pain for the rest of his life so I dont ride them that much because I can never remember which one is the evil streetcar that hurt my dad -> he used to point it out when we would drive by... i think its a different color now cause i havnt seen it in a bit.
Whenever I can travel to SF one day, I’ll have to ride every kind of train that I can as well as in LA. I like how the streetcars have liveries of all kinds of cities throughout North America. I’ve never heard of that, it’s something I learned in this video. I’ll have to get the ones I can of any of them.
When I lived in San Francisco, I only took the F car once. However, when I did use it, it was surprisingly pleasant and went down Market St pretty quickly considering all the stops. I was a kid in the 70s and remember the Embarcadero Frwy, what a brutalist monstrosity. It was 2 levels and the lower level was so dark and gloomy. The first I ever remember seeing the Ferry Bldg was after the frwy was torn down. The frwy totally hid the Ferry Bldg. San Francisco is one of the only cities that still has a string of functioning and restored historic wharves. Most of Manhattan's old wharves got torn down in the 80s. I also occasionally took the California St cable car from downtown to Van Ness (and then the rest of the way home on a bus) when I was stressed from work and wanted to wind down pleasantly. The cable cars were also included in my monthly Muni Pass. The California St cable car is rarely crowded so it's a good choice. It was great on warm evenings w a great view of the Bay Bridge but I also loved riding the cable car in the rain. The rain gave the whole experience a Dashiel Hammett noir kind of feel. I'm glad you enjoyed San Francisco. I hate seeing downtown so empty. Before the pandemic, the streets and sidewalks of downtown were jam packed everyday.
