PCC trolley car one minute love story

[daveklepper]

For those that did not make the contact from the TRAINS site, pull up the commercial site:

www.us.dockers.com

and go to "Waht's New"

Hope you love it as much as I did.

[Jetrock]

Those PCC cars are no strangers to anyone who visits San Francisco--I deliberately take the Amtrak bus into the city so I can take a PCC or Peter Witt up Market Street.

One thing I noticed about the commercial is that they seem to have digitally removed Oakland from the background--you see the tracks near the waterfront, and the Bay Bridge (minus all the new construction and any boat traffic) but you don't see the Oakland hills, except the barest outline. The Bay can get foggy, but generally on a day as clear as the one in the commercial you get a good view of the shipping and heavy cranes across the Bay.

[MisterBeasley]

Thanks for the heads-up. For those who've never had the pleasure of visiting the city, San Francisco's trolley system is a "living museum" of trolleys from all over, some even from Europe as I recall. They've refurbished whole fleets of cars they've bought from other cities that were getting rid of their old light rail equipment. Now, they are in daily service for use by commuters and tourists alike.

How many of us still kick ourselves for getting rid of our old Lionels when we were younger? Well, that's how many of the "donor" cities now feel about their old PCC cars when they see what San Francisco has done with them.

[dknelson]

AS I mentioned on the Trains portion of the forum if you like PCC cars by all means visit Kenosha Wisconsin. The city has installed a large loop from their Metra station around to some municipal buildings and a nice natural history museum, past condos and apartments near the lakefront and harbor. The ride costs -- brace yourself -- 25 cents.
And they have painted the PCCs to honor the paint schemes of great cities that had them.
By the way Corgi makes a 1:50 PCC in "Kenosha" colors -- the Chicago surface lines green color. Nice model.
Not directly on the trolley line but not too far to walk in Kenosha's transportation museum which a bit of railroad stuff but is mostly devoted to the Rambler and other Kenosha made automobiles. Worth a visit and it has a nice gift shop.
Not too far from Kenosha are the trolley museum in East Troy WI and the Illinois RR Museum in Union IL so if you like traction, you could spend an entire weekend between the three and not burn up TOO much precious gasoline.
Dave Nelson

[Anonymous]

Ironically, I was just out there towards the end of August and got a chance to ride the trolley from one end to the other. Total time was about an hour in each direction. The cars are well maintained, they were brought mostly from the Toronto system and then repainted to match up other cities in the US. It is a great tourist attraction and they give you a transfer when you first get on. So the whole trip cost my wife and i $3.00. We also used the transfers that evening for the trackless and went to China town. A great deal.

[Jetrock]

I spent all day today at a streetcar conference discussing ways to bring back trolleys to urban life--including the radical idea of, rather than re-inventing the wheel-on-rail, simply to start producing new PCC cars! Several companies make replica double-truck Birney and Brill style cars, and the PCC's natural simplicity, ruggedness, comfort and classic styling would be a natural--they look good sitting in front of 120 year old buildings or brand-new steel-and-concrete structures.

Items like this commercial definitely give the impression that trolleys are once again on the public's mind--but style is important! The commercial wouldn't have been the same if the couple were riding a pair of Muni's old Boeing LRVs...

[trolleyboy]

Dave nice commersial thanks for sharing it. By the by if anyone has a trolley museum near them and you are evn the moct closet of a fan why not join up. If your local museum is so equiped you could even learn to operate one. I know that I'm more happy now that I can operate the cars at the musuem I'm a member of. We have many PCC's on sight. One is even an air electric version from 1938 TTC 4000 the original Toronto PCC which started the TTC off on it's eventually North American city largest PCC fleet. Well in excess of 750 cars at the height, many purschased off of US cities that were shutting down streetcar operations. The TTC still owns three PCC's which they charter out and on occasion they will run them and their small Peter Witt on occastional summer service on the harbour front line. Rob

[daveklepper]

Why do I love this commercial and why did I post it here and on TRAINS and CLASSIC TRAINS. More than pure railfanning, there are other reasons. First, I have been both a TRAINS subscriber and a member of the Electric Railroaders Association since I was about 15 years old, 1947 or so. I am also a member of Branford, Boston Street Railway Association, and the Light Railway Transport Association (UK). I would like to rejoin CERA (once a member) also NRHS, and Union, and also join for the first time Market St. RY. Assoc. I need to plan the budget for the next few years accordingly. When I was Pres. of the ERA I also ran an SF convention, and Murrey Kleibolt was aboard for the activities among about 50 or 60 railfans. The summer was when the MUNI METRO first went into service. On weekdays the J Church was still PCC using the surface tracks, the L was a PCC shuttle to the West Portal of the Twin Peaks, and the N Judah and K and M were using the Boings into the subway. Our convention had everything, including 01, a Boeing, and a double-end PCC. On Sunday morning I got to the Cable barn early with some fans to take out our cable car for the morning tour. I found a green Powell car waiting. I said to the Barn Chief, "We arranged for one of the California double-end cars." He said: "I know, but you have to use the Powell car for the first part of the tour because the California car is too long to fit the Hyde turntable." I said: "But we are not going to use the turntable. We are going to use the crossover just before the turntable." (This involves "letting go" and coasting over the crossover.) He said: "You can't; that is impossible." I said: "Yes we can, the Bay Area Eelctric Railfans did it two months ago." He said: "I'll check" and made a phone call in his office. He then returned, said "OK, I'll let you take out a California car. Actually, I am happy to have additional Powell car because we expect long lines at the Powell and Market turntable today." I said something like: "Have you ever considered extending the vintage streetcar line out the Embarcadaro to take the pressure off the cable cars?" He said: "I'll suggest it to the managment." I'm not saying that it was my suggestion the started this line's construction. The Market Street Ry. Association have enough good thinkers to come up with ideas like this themselves. But it might have helped, and at least the fans got their pictures of a California car on the Hyde line, a vision of the past.

I am now a Rabbinical/Cantorial student in Jerusalem and any advertisement that show that real people do indeed ride electric transit and thus may result in slightly less money to that great creator of terrorism in Saudi Arabia obviously gets my double blessing.

[Jetrock]

Indeed--public awareness of electric transit is growing! I am a BAERA member too, although I'd rather sit in the nice air-conditioned archives than work out in the carbarn. It is my ambition to help bring trolleys back to the streets of Sacramento, just as they came back to San Francisco--the conference on Friday showed me that I'm not the only one with that idea!

[daveklepper]

But doesn't Sacramento already have a light rail system with some downtown street running? So wouldn't it be feasible to run heritage equipment on it? Don't they do that on the similar system in San Jose?

[Jetrock]

Sacramento does have a light rail system, and there is some potential for heritage equipment, but it is limited. Downtown is run with simple trolley wire, but outside of downtown is primarily catenary intended for pantographs--a regular trolley pole would have difficulty with dewiring due to the zig-zag pattern of the wire.

Also, the Sacramento LRVs run on 750v power, and most legacy trolley equipment is wired for 600 volt. We do have one legacy trolley set up for it, Car 35, that is run on special occasions (I got to ride it Friday afternoon after the conference.)

Thing is, LRVs are more like interurbans than street trolleys--they are pretty good at moving people from the suburbs to downtown, but not so good at moving people around downtown. They're a bit too bulky, and the lines run in one end of downtown and out the other, without a lot of street coverage. Essentially, about half of downtown is an inconveniently long walk to the trolley.

A streetcar-scaled vehicle, something along the lines of a double-truck Birney, would be better suited to circulating people around the business/commercial districts.

I kind of like Portland's model: they have a light-rail system to carry people from the suburbs to downtown, and then a central-city tstreetcar to cart people around the business district., plus a heritage trolley line showcasing the antique cars.

I suppose I am enamored of the idea of multiple electric lines: the RT LRV serving like the SN's interurban transit line, hitting suburbs and nearby cities, and local streetcars to serve downtown and central-city neighborhoods. The more the better!

[daveklepper]

I agree with you that Portland is a wonderful model. Indeed, San Francisco is similar with six tracks for Market Street. Lower Level subway, BART, really an electrified commuter railroad, the middle level MUNI Metro, light rail, and a real streetcar on the surface making local stops between the stations of the other two rail operations.

Quiz question: Where else in the USA are there six tracks for one street between mutlple stations?

[daveklepper]

No answers? Well, New York's 42nd Dt has a four track section of the Grand Central Times Square shuttle that is paralleled by the No., 7 Flushing line with its two additional tracks, but one of the Shuttle tracks is now just an enongated crossover between two adjancent tracks although once upon a time the Shuttle was part of the first subway route up 4th Avenue from City Hall, across 42nd to Timnes Sq, and then up Broadway. Also between 14th Street and 32nd Street Herald Square the four tracks of the Sixth Avenue Subway (B, D, F) are paralleled by the two tracks of the PATH system, ofrmerly the Hudson and Manhattan or Hudson TYubes. Then in Brooklyn around Eastern Parkway and Flatbush Avenue the 4-track Brooklyn IRT subway (2,3,4,5) is paralleled by the twotrack Brioghtopn Line subway (Bm Q).

There are probably similar cases overseas, but if anyone knows of another six track urban situation in the USA or Canada, please tell us about it! Anyway, the six tracks on Market Street include streetcar tracks and that makes it special.