Cable Cars

Alcatraz Cable Cars Chinatown Ghirardelli Golden Gate Bridge Harbor Cruise Sausalito South San Francisco Union Square Washington Square 1988

Cable Cars

 

 

 

The California Street line runs East-West from the Financial District, through Chinatown, over Nob Hill and stops at Van Ness Avenue. Since all the cars on this line have the same routes, the signs are painted directly on the car.
 

cable car route system

 

 

 

 

The driving force behind the San Francisco cable car system came from a man who witnessed a horrible accident on a typically damp summer day in 1869. Andrew Smith Hallidie saw the toll slippery grades could extract when a horse- drawn streetcar slid backwards under its heavy load. The steep slope with wet cobblestones and a heavily weighted vehicle combined to drag five horses to their deaths. Although such a sight would stun anyone, Hallidie and his partners had the know-how to do something about the problem.

 

rounding the bend

 

 

Hallidie had been born in England and moved to the U.S. in 1852. His father filed the first patent in Great Britain for the manufacture of wire- rope. As a young man, Hallidie found uses for this technology in California's Gold Country. He used the wire-rope when designing and building a suspension bridge across Sacramento's American River. He also found another use for the wire-rope when pulling heavy ore cars out of the underground mines on tracks. The technology was in place for pulling cable cars.

The next step bringing Hallidie closer to his fate was moving his wire- rope manufacturing to San Francisco. All that was now needed was seeing the accident for the idea to become full blown-a cable car railway system to deal with San Francisco's fearsome hills.

 

end of this line

 

 

The Powell-Hyde line begins at the Powell Market turntable and runs over Nob and Russian hills before ending at Aquatic Park near Ghiradelli Square.

 

 

the turn around

 

 

starting in a cable car up the hill

 

passing some of those small yellow vehicles rented by visitors

 

past the famous Swensen's Ice Cream parlor

 

cable pulling the car up the steep street

 

a view of Grace Episcopal Cathedral

 

on Nob Hill

 

down the steep incline
Transamerica building in the background

 

Eastern skyline of San Francisco

 

the trolley cars of San Francisco

 

on Market Street

 

waiting at the intersection 


Alcatraz Cable Cars Chinatown Ghirardelli Golden Gate Bridge Harbor Cruise Sausalito South San Francisco Union Square Washington Square 1988

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