Subway, Elevated, Trolley & Traction Lines photos

[healey36]

Thanks for that, Ben. I recalled seeing this pic of the Queensboro bridge while being built:



Extreme cantilevered construction, lol...

Healey

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Soon after getting assigned to DC, I had to drive late at night from the Bureau of Naval Personnel to the Pentagon to make a delivery, I ended up at the Jefferson Memorial calling for help on a payphone. That was the mid '70's, I imagine it's gotten much worse.

Late at night can be bad if you don;t know where you are going in any city. BUPERS was and is in Arlington so if you were crossing a bridge over the river, you knew you were (1) lost and (2) hosed. I've done that in the middle of the day simply because I could not get over a lane and got trapped in traffic taking me over a bridge. I generally manage to navigate to the next bridge up and cross back over -- some days that's actually more efficient!

[Rufus T. Firefly]

I know i call that whole area DC. Here is a funny DC. subway story. I was working in an antique show there. When it was over for the day. a few of us wanted Chinese food. So we hop into a guys Hummer and head into downtown. At some point we decide it would be better to use the subway. We park his hummer in a construction site and place a few orange cones around it. One of the guys looks at the subway rail line board and says. " I got this it will be about a 20 minute ride. He was right. We switched a train or 2 to get where we wanted to be. Had a great dinner. Got back to the subway and found our way back to his car. No tickets nothing on his windshield. Everything was fine. We pull out of the construction site and turn right. go about 20 feet and see the Chinese restaurant we had dinner in. The guy that pick our route is red/green color blind. He had us ridding all over DC. just to go 20 feet from where we parked.

Actually, the best part of that was the parking!

[E7]

GREAT stuff Ben!!!!

[E7]

Ahhhhhhhh, Washington DC, known to Yankee ne'er-do-wells without city maps, as H*ll on the Potomac! It's long been my hypothesis that several fifths of whiskey were consumed before they started laying out DC, and the adjoining burbs were done with the same amount of indiscretion. Some classics: Was given directions to a friends in Falls Church and told to go on Gallows Road, without the notation that Gallows Road disappeared (became a different named street) for 2 or 3 blocks and then resumed under that name. Another time, given directions to Army Navy CC which said turn on 18th street! Passed 17th and the next number I came to was 19th! Found out one had to turn on a non-numbered street and go in about 3 or 4 blocks to pick up 18th. More FUN: Attempting to return home to PA, came out of Alexandria and got on I-395 North forgetting that to get to I-495 N one had to go SOUTH on I-395.......ended up taking metro DC tour! Can't come close to matching the Chinese restaurant story!

[healey36]

A bit off-topic, but a nice photo...Fulton Ferry Farragut churns across the East River around the turn of the century:



Fulton went out of business in January 1924, its demise primarily attributed to declining ridership due to the Brooklyn Bridge (see background).

Healey

[Wolf]

Fulton Ferries must have been a really tough, tenacious company if
took the Brooklyn Bridge over 40 years to run it out of business...

Getting back to Washington DC street layout...I find DC is laid out
with some logic once you factor in those diagonal "state" Avenues.
Where I get lost in is Baltimore---seems every street heads for the
nearest hill with little regard for any street grid !

[healey36]

Fulton Ferries must have been a really tough, tenacious company if
took the Brooklyn Bridge over 40 years to run it out of business...

I had that thought as well...people must have been scared of bridges for the first thirty years.

[healey36]

A mule-drawn trolley, No. 44, in Covington, Georgia, C. 1888-1900:



From the Library of Congress, photographer unknown. Taken on Clark Street, in front of the Newton County Courthouse.

Healey

[healey36]

Car no. 265, Como-Harriet Streetcar Line (Minnesota Streetcar Museum), at the corner of 42nd Street and Queen Avenue, Minneapolis, Minnesota:



From the Library of Congress, HAER study MINN.27-MINAP, 14-1 (late 1980's or early 1990's judging by the model of VW automobile in the background).

Healey

[healey36]

Line car A, Yakima Valley Transportation Company, Yakima County, Washington:



From HAER Wash.39-YAK.V.1-J, collection of the LIbrary of Congress.

[Tom Dempsey]

This is the one I'm planning to build, albeit, as originally delivered and run.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

This is the one I'm planning to build, albeit, as originally delivered and run.

You have plans to work from of what?

[healey36]

Here's another shot, Tom, from the same study:



It's crazy-looking thing, quite ramshackle in appearance. I recall occasionally seeing the line cars for the Baltimore streetcar line when I was a boy...I don't recall them looking quite like this.

Healey

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Pretty sure it was done as a brass import in HO - Suydam, maybe. Somewhere I think I grabbed a set of photos of the model thinking to build this line car myself someday.