Funeral LRV

[gardendance]

Branford Electric Railway has a car with longitudinal seats. For Halloween I was body in coffin. That's as close as I've gotten to a funeral trolley.

[highgreen]

Beechview, right. The 42S and 42C run there on Broadway Ave. between Neeld and Fallowfield Aves. There's private ROW on both sides of that stretch. The 52/Allentown street runs (rush hours only) on Arlington and Warrington Aves. through the Allentown and Beltzhoover neighborhoods.

[jrbernier]

  In the Twin Cities, the Hiawatha Corridor LRV's blew their warning horns by the cemetary as they passed when Gearge Isaacs was laid to rest.  George was one of the founding fathers of the MTM 1300 restoration, and a tireless proponant for the Hiawatha Corridor LRV project.

  A fitting tribute to the man.....

 

Jim Bernier

[artpeterson]

While not an "LRV", CA&E also had a funeral car, their 109.  It and the Met West Side car 756 that Paul mentioned earlier ran out to the near west side cemeteries (around the end of today's Forest Park branch of the CTA Blue Line).  The 756 (as CER, CRT and then CTA) 2756 became a medical examination car for operating employees.  It performed these duties on CNS&M and CA&E as well as for CRT.  Last trip onto CNS&M to perform these duties was in 1948.  Art

[artpeterson]

CSL's predecessors had two funeral cars; these became CSL 2857 and 2858, as regular passenger cars.  Art

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

The Chicago Rapid Transit Co. also had a funeral car.  It was inherited from the Met L (West Side lines) since there were several cemeteries in Forest Park and near Hillside.  The cemeteries near Hillside were at the end of the CA&E Cook County branch.

I'm not sure if Chicago Surface Lines had a funeral car.

[Eltraino3]

Um... Where does the 42S do Street Running? I believe most of the line is Private ROW or underground? perhaps you were in Beechview or Allentown?

[daveklepper]

Thanks for the correction. 

[erikem]

OERM has the LARy's Descanso.

[daveklepper]

Many streetcar systems had funeral cars.   Some were large enough to be both the hearse and the morners'c car, but more often the funeral car carried the coffin and a few people and the system's officials' parlor car followed.   Best example of a streetcar parlor is Connecticut Co. 500 at Shore Line Trolley Museum, East Haven and Branford, CT.  www.bera.org    I think both Seashore and Rio Vista Jc. have funeral cars, the latter the Delarossa  - -  Los Angeles Ry or Pacific Electric?

[highgreen]

This mid-morning I rode Pittsburgh's 42S light rail line downtown. The line is mostly private ROW, but with about 3/4 mi. of street running through the Beechview neighborhood. Our LRV waited several minutes at Shiras Ave. as a long funeral procession pulled out in front of us from the undertaker's lot. As the last auto fell in line, our LRT fell in right behind it. So for a few blocks, until the mourners pulled into a church parking lot, ours was the last "car" in the procession. May he or she rest in peace. As I got off in the downtown subway, I jokingly asked the operator if he had retured his magnetic "Funeral" flags.

This reminded me that once upon a time, in the pre-auto, pre funeral home days of street railways, pall bearers sometimes carried the casket from the deceased's home to a nearby (hopefully!) hearse trolley. The mourner's trolley would then follow behind it to the cemetery. This morning's ride was probably the closest I'll ever get to that in this lifetime - or the next!