This is an absolutely brilliant explication of how five original Muni streetcar lines survived. A couple of notes, though, to clarify. First, Muni did intend to replace the J-Church in the early 1950s with electric trolley buses, which could easily climb Church Street itself, bypassing the, er, bypass. Neighborhood opposition squelched that. Second, BART never intended to establish a "second, local BART service inside the city". The Muni Metro subway level downtown, and its extension to Castro, was always to be part of Muni, and was included to get San Franciscans to vote for the BART bonds. In 1966, Muni asked voters to approve more bonds to make the Muni subway level a true Metro, including only the M and N lines, and putting the outer ends of those lines underground. But voters did not approve. That's how all five lines, the J, K, L, M, and N, ended up in the subway.
@@ababababaababbba Yes, but not through the second level of the Market subway. As always with BART, that was supposed to just be a spur off the main line. BART does this all throughout its system. The way the spurs all interline is supposed to match commuting patterns. BART brings people from out in the suburbs to denser and denser areas with the lines interlining more and more to eventually all join together in the Transbay Tunnel. The idea was that the BART lines would do the same in reverse once they reached SF. But we stopped funding BART so we only got half a system.
Ugh, that crazy interlining pattern is still the transit mistake of the century! I understand that every SF NIMBY wants _his_ train to go all way downtown through the tunnel. But every single transit engineer that they asked told them that this interlining was an idiotic idea. As always, SF caved to the loudest activists and allowed this ridiculous service pattern that hobbles Muni to this day. I know that the T will now run into the Central Subway instead. And they seem to be intent on moving the single-car J onto the surface alignment on Market. And just maybe the L will be rerouted to Balboa Park instead of the tunnel. But that subway is still at least two lines too interlined. With street-running trams that get stuck in car traffic, the last thing you want to make them do is to interline in a complicated ballet of the absurd to all cram into one single tunnel. The fact that Muni still does these crazy maneuvers all these years later is insane!
Thank you for clarifying that. Out of curiosity is there any concept art for how the Muni Metro would have looked had it been implemented as a heavy rail system?
To be fair, it is entirely possible ot have fast frequent service on surface level street cars, and many cities do it. The trick is to give these systems their own lane seperate from private motor traffic. Considering that there are two lanes of traffic and two for parking on most roads, along major public transport routes all you would have to do is turn the two parking lanes into private traffic lanes, and let the trams and buses have their own dedicated lanes on the street. It is a quick and very cheap fix for a massive improvement on public transport. If you want to take it a step further, you do what Zürich has done for decades, and other cities have also implemented, where traffic lights automatically stop cross traffic when a tram/bus is approaching so that public transport never stops at lights. At the end of the day its just a matter of priorities, and in the US public transit is unfortunately very far down on the list.
And, for the love of god, don’t have your trains stop at stop signs. Prevent cross streets from running through if you have to. Every time I watch a Muni line operating in mixed traffic, I die a little.
Oh god!God!! Really!! San Francisco has twice the population of Zurich and occupies a quarter of the land mass. If you are going to be critical, educate yourself. Hell, San Francisco is not even the biggest city in the Bay Area. Don't be dumb.
Checkout Manchester, UK which has a system which runs on the street in the city and streetcars but is a rapid transit system on its own network out of town.
Great video, I think a lot of the "wistfulness" for the streetcar era more harkens back to a time when people and cities actually cared about having good public transit infrastructure that, you know, worked for the public to maintain a sense of walkability. It's an ethos that most american cities (SF is a rare exception) have lost, by way of turning many streetcar routes into bus services then cutting those buses to provide infrastructure for cars. American cities used to have some of the best public transit infrastructure in the world, and now we just don't seem to care much anymore.
The thing is, america always goes with whatever is cheapest. When they were in their heyday, streetcars were simply the cheapest option for cities to maintain vs infrastructure for expensive cars, which very few people owned. It’s sad, but it’s true that once more people could get cars, it was simply cheaper for cities to cater to them
@@Shinyarc it’s not cheapest. At least not in the long term. Generally American politicians make decisions based on what companies lobby them the hardest, not what is more affordable or good for the American people
Great video! Your next one should be on unbuilt BART lines/projects like Marin County, Market Street (as you wonderfully alluded to here) a second bay crossing to name but a few...
As someone who lives on Dolores and uses the J regularly, this vid is great. Imo the J and N should be combined as complete streetcar line, that way there can be less jams and more frequency on the other lines in the market street subway, they can just transfer to the subway at Church station. Also couldn't agree more about Geary street (and tbh also Van Ness, Sunset, and 19th Ave could also use a subway)
Fantastic video. Living in the inner Sunset district, I use to ride the N Judah all the time through the sunset tunnel to go downtown. I also miss taking the 38 Geary bus out to 48th avenue and Cabrillo street to Playland
Nobody in their right mind would have wanted to scrap the street car system. Especially if you considered replacing it with a more expensive BART system. The advantage of the street car system is that it is an on and off system. You get on on street level and off on street level.
Man, as someone living in the UK, I had _no idea_ just how darned _pretty_ San Francisco really is! Especially in the bright sun! It's made me realise just how little footage I've actually seen of San Fran, other than the classic "here's a quick look at a really steep street and an old-timey cable car". It clearly has _so_ much character and is actually a genuinely _good looking_ city, which is a really hard thing to achieve even with modern developments and more modern cities. Plus it looks like there's lots of green spaces and parks around with some really _fantastic_ views!! I'm rather jealous now. I live in a relatively flat, large-ish town, mostly consisting of similar/identical brick houses and not much else - and even where there _are_ hills there isn't much to see/look at and definitely none of the views you fine folks get!
It certainly makes an impression on me pretty much every time I walk through it. Seemingly one of the few US cities I've been to where I can get around almost entirely on walking and public transit, and gives you the views for doing it too.
@@sunshineyellow The thing to remember is that "everyone" is just a very loud but small segment of our population who have never been to the city before and should be ignored.
Excellent explanation of how we got today’s streetcars/subway hybrid. I love the segues into local history (the fire hydrant, the gravestones, the Eureka Valley "ghost” station) too!
Streetcar/lightrail hybrids are actually a perfect, flexible solution. Easily accessible, decent capacity, no need for expensive infrastructure where it's not necessary (and it can be gradually improved), relatively cheap to build & run (which makes it feasible to operate a dense network, which in turn improves accessibility and overall door-to-door speed), ... So if you don't need the capacity of a full-fledged subway this is a perfectly fine way to build public transport. But even if you do build a subway, on-street public transport can still be a valuable supplement for local trips/the "last mile". E.g. here in Vienna we made the mistake of ripping out streetcar routes when we built our subway; now the subway is overcrowded in some sections with people only going 1-2 stops, which would actually have been faster before in the streetcar (simply because of the subway's longer access way from street level to platform and the lower station density overall). Also: There are multiple solutions if your streetcars get stuck in traffic. Separate lanes, priorization at traffic lights (or even priorization of car traffic/gatekeeper signals, to clear the road ahead of the streetcar), ... it's only a question of priorities. Making on-street public transport more attractive also generally reduces traffic delays, even for motorists (simply because a passenger in a bus or streetcar only takes up a fraction of the space compared to cars; and because the vehicles are in operation all day, and not parked - still taking up valuable space - for 20+ hours).
Americans love using confusing terminology.. Light rail (streetcars) can be used for street, dedicated right of way and subway operations using the same rolling stock. There is no difference as light rail is very versatile.
There's a distinction among light rail, heavy rail, heavy rail/rapid transit, and heavy rail/commuter rail. The term _light rail_ was coined in 1972 by the U.S. Urban Mass Transportation Administration (UMTA; the precursor to the Federal Transit Administration) to describe new streetcar transformations that were taking place in Europe and the United States.
@@RaymondHng - I know the term light rail was coined in 1972 by by the U.S. Urban Mass Transportation Administration as to give a new term for 'streetcars' despite the fact trams/streetcars are light rail operations which have been operating in various guises since 1807 when the first horse-drawn passenger tramway started operation in Wales(UK). The word 'tramway' was the early version of light rail.
@@chrismckellar9350 In North America, the term _tram_ is more likely to be understood as an aerial tramway or a people-mover. Unlike other languages such as Spanish and French, there is no international governing body that regulates use of the English language.
Growing up in San Francisco in the 70's I remember watching the transition from the old streetcar system to the newer light rail style. We were completely amazed by the moving stairs in the LRV's.
Me too. We would always come to San Francisco to visit family back then,and I remember when they transitioned from the old PCC cars to the Boeing LRV and the Metro. Took a long time for folks to get used to.
Really well done video! Thought I knew everything about streetcar history in SF but learned quite a few new things! Looking forward to more transit history content 👍😃
Most streetcars in Bratislava are separated, even in the city center. Running on the surface is not the problem. Nor is running through pedestrian zones. Running with cars is a problem and it can be solved super easily. Btw. very nice video, I learned something new about the SF system. I hope one day I will visit SF.
4:52 The old unburnt side reminds me of Boston while the new rebuilt side has New York City vibes. Definitely the unburnt side is more charming and therefore more cherished. 8:58 I think not building the BART Geary Street Tunnel was a mistake. It could have been the beginning of a second transbay tube! EDIT: I think San Francisco's hills are also why the city's trolleybusses/trackless trolleys survived. Boston recently got rid of theirs this past March! It was big mistake IMO.
Geary as a BART subway (rather than Muni), in conjunction with the second Transbay Tube, is very much on the proverbial table right now with the Link21 project.
originally the plan was to have Bart service through the Richmond and possibly a crossing to Marin by modifying the Golden Gate Bridge with a lower deck
Its telling that bart's inital design document included a geary street subway that went down 19th st. Hopefully the city and BART can reexamine and make it a reality.
As a transit planner I like the franken system - it provides good local coverage in the suburbs and grade separation and capacity down town. Full grade separation in the burbs would have led to less frequent stations and less vibrancy, access and activity
Market Street is now prohibiting private vehicular traffic east of 10th Street. This allows only buses, trolleybuses, and the F Market streetcar line to run on the surface of Market Street. The K Ingleside, L Taraval, M Oceanview, and N Judah run on tracks in semi-dedicated-to-dedicated lanes on city surface streets. Parts of the M and N also run on full grade separated tracks in the outlying areas.
@@RaymondHng : "M Oceanview, and N Judah run on tracks in semi-dedicated-to-dedicated lanes on city surface streets" Uhhhhh no. Only PARTLY true. The M only is on private ROW from St. Francis Circle to the intersection of 19th Avenue and Junipero Serra. From there it travels on shared streets in the Oceanview where the M is slow as shiite. The N is only private ROW at 9th and Judah to 19th Avenue and Judah where it goes back to sharing Judah with autos though there are signs telling autos to stay off the N tracks. As a side note: many many eons ago, I was doing my graduate work at SFSU and working as an office monkey in the Financial District. I used to actually hop onto the M Oceanview TO Balboa Park station where I would transfer to a BART train headed to the Embarcadero Station and the office. Believe it or not, BART plus the M through Oceanview to SFSU was USUALLY faster than M through Twin Peaks tunnel to SFSU.
That`s a great story about tram in a big hilly city. And, what the most precious in this story - tram survived and his network is developing now. Here in my country capital city, Kyiv, Ukraine, some steepest lines were demolished "to make space for cars". Projects of tram tunnels were made, but not realised.
Idk, you can have both streetcars and subway. And you can have a subway line and a streetcar line on the same street, you see that quite frequently with the trams and U-Bahn in Berlin for example. Trams usually have one or two more stops between the U-Bahn stations and so kind of function like Local/Express
We have that on Market St. Double decker subway underneath and The F heritage street car route above it in some dedicated lanes and is quite popular with tourists and commuters. Part of Market St closed off to cars a couple years ago to improve reliability of transit.
Tbh,as a kid, I loved the old green Muni streetcars. The Key System in the East Bay was long gone before I was born, so taking BART over to SF to ride the Muni was always an adventure. As an adult now, I'd much rather take the Muni than driving and trying to find parking. This video really took me back in time.
I never comment on videos but: Absolutely amazing. 10/10. Fantastic content. History, rail, and transit - I feel like this video was made for me. Subscribed. Looking forward to future videos!
Dude, this is so cool to learn the lore behind the streetcars. We really live in a special place. That tip about why Castro's platforms are so ridiculously long blew my mind. Love this stuff. Also yes, Geary needs a streetcar sooooo bad oml the Richmond needs that so bad!
Hi from Melbourne, Australia. We also never lost our tram system which is the largest tram network in the world with around 250km (150mi) of track. Trams have priority on the road and cars behind or alongside the tram must stop when it does. I wouldn't swap our trams for anything.
Former Liberal Premier Sir Henry Bolte wanted to close Melbourne's tram system, but couldn't because the Victorian Government didn't own it. He did unfortunately manage to rip up the Bendigo and Ballarat systems in 1970 because the Vic government did own them (via the State Electricity Commission).
Exceptional video-thank you for producing this. I’ve lived here my whole life and didn’t know some of these tidbits! Aside from a Geary subway, we need Divis/Castro from the Marina to Noe Valley!
I moved to SF last year and I always enjoy learning new things about this city. Thank you for the informative video. I never really questioned why some lines are serviced by bus and others by street car (as well as the letter/number naming system) but it all makes more sense with context.
I used to live on the N Judah line at Duboce Park and loved taking the Muni. Maybe it wasn’t super speedy on the surface streets but I loved the hybrid nature of the Muni. And to me it feels more sophisticated riding a streetcar like Muni than a bus, I’m not sure why
My parents lived at Duboce and Noe next to Duboce Park before I was born. Mom told me all the stories about the old days of Muni. I always rode the N to visit my dad when we were in town from LA. Still ride the N to this day.
Me too! On Scott across from what eventually became the Harvey Milk Community Center. My N Judah stop was right at the tunnel. I always felt there was a specialness about the rounded streetcars, and as a little kid attending Mission Dolores I often used to ride on the back (outside), hanging on to the wire for dear life, from Dolores Park to Market Street…fair memories. Settled in those sagging green seats, hearing the clink of the coins deposited in the fare box or the sound of the fare card being punched by the driver, standing up to pull the cord, exiting down the rears steps through the folding doors… all visceral body memories :-) There was a hierarchy of preference for me. I loved every thrilling cable car ride. Next were the green & creme streetcars with their clanking and occasional disconnects, then the electrified buses (the 22 was my regular), and finally the big old loud & rumbling (diesel?) bus lines slowly making their way.
@@Yowzoe My mom told me that she used to do the same thing through the Sunset Tunnel when she lived on Duboce with my dad before I was born. She did the same thing in LA with the Yellow Cars when she was a kid. I got to ride those as an infant right up to the last run in '63. I always remember how those old Muni cars would be heading through the Twin Peaks Tunnel,and right around Forest Hill,they would lose power. The pole always came off when the N would be making the turn onto Irving at 9th Ave. We stopped going to SF in the 70's after my mom remarried,but those were what I always remember about the old cars.
I don't own a car in SF. I rely on my bicyle and Muni. I love the Muni metro, the only thing I would change is honestly its frequency. The services could stand to be closer together. I rarely find the trains to be overly crowded with exception of the morning train to work which is during a peak rush hour time. Then I am usually required to stand until Embaracadero at which point I can sit but that is really a minor complaint for what is honestly a very nice way to get round. I do wish we'd retained some of those services above ground rail like they originally were over the bus system, though projects like the Van Ness Bus lanes do make it a bit easier to not fall victim to the traffic. I dont pretend to haver all the information just my own observations as a resident.
I rode the old cars above ground on Market as a kid in the 60's and 70's before and during the construction of the subway. The service was usually frequent on weekdays. And the traffic on Market east of Van Ness often caused delays. And the first couple of years of the subway,it only ran on weekdays,the J still ran above ground on Market.
Bravo! This video blew my mind 4 or 5 times. Can't believe the the recycled headstones at buena vista or that Bart was planning on stopping at Castro Street! 🤯
I feel the same way, having grown up in SF. This guy has made a compelling video with wonderful editing and fascinating history, and as many people have said, let's hope he continues :-)
Thanks for the informative history. Even though streetcars can get stuck in traffic, I think they're more energy efficient, don't pollute as much, require less maintenance, and last longer compared to buses.
And streetcars are just more pleasant to ride. I want to love buses because they cost relatively little to deploy and are flexible, but I simply don't like riding them. Market Street has both busses and streetcars, and I'll literally watch the busses go by and wait so I can take a streetcar.
Track maintenance is almost as much as busses, and they require a lot of electrically to run. They are changing one carbon for another carbon, electrically does not come out of thin air. I happen to like the streetcars but they are just another mode of transportation not more or less anything then busses.
@@scotttild The whole *_"changing one carbon for another carbon"_* argument is deliberately misleading and has got to *STOP* now. It totally ignores the massive improvements currently being made to the power grid. On April 30, 2022 California for the first time ran on 100% clean energy with solar making up the largest slice.
@scotttild I think the streetcars themselves are less maintenance than busses and last longer, and I've read differently on the energy consumption on using electric versus diesel (or at least electric is not putting out as much smoke close to you). I'm comparing to diesel busses of course, not electric or alternative fuel.
Pre-pandemic, my family used to travel to San Francisco a lot, and I was always eager to ride the streetcars as a railfan myself. We look forward to going back there sometime in the near future! ~A fan from the Philippines 🇵🇭
Pinoy to kabayan, Ive been here since 94 but frequent traveller to PI, SF have change a lot ,too much homelessness and drugs (legal to shoot heroin) in the street especially the Tenderloin District, other parts are doing well and big development in the south of market (Mission Bay where the Warriors arena located and big hospitals...much better now after 3 years of pandemic but still financial district is slow (still lots of work at home so those buildings are just 40% occupied..
Good video. Growing up taking the metro in the 80s, I recall muni ran 4 and 6 car trains in the Market St tunnel with L, M, and K trains decoupling into 2 car trains at west portal and J and N trains decoupling into 2 car trains at Duboce Ave.
Yes, and the coupling and linking the electronics was always a disaster as were the whole Boeing Vertol cars. At West Portal going downtown they used to practically crash them into each other, sometimes more than once.
@@emjayay Yep. The Boeing trains were crap. The doors always malfunctioned. As did the stairs when it would come in/out of the tunnel. And the AC often didn't work. I remember when they would couple the K/L/M all the way to West Portal,then separate them off. I wish the N ran 3-car trains,but the platforms on Judah/Irving/Carl St aren't long enough to accommodate them.
Great video! I love the hydrant that saved San Francisco, or at least that section. I live in Baltimore & remember before living there the street car lines. The dependence on the automobile and the bus killed what could have been a very good transit system. Thank you for posting and all the best.
I used to go to SF on weekends and would often overshoot my downtown Van Ness stop to ride the metro for fun. The transitions between the central underground section and aboveground sections are quite special IMO. The train just stops there while the steps slowly move into position, and suddenly you go from fairly normal subway right onto the tight, hilly streets of SF, and every so often move off the street again to grade-separated sections. It's cool to see some of the history visualized and to learn that these transitions were also what helped keep the metro in place. Definitely looking forward to you making more content about Fog City history!
Excellent video! I did know that the streetcar line letters came from the old Muni streetcars but I didn't know that the bus line numbers came from the Market St RR. That's pretty cool. I do love how you weaved SF history into the story. The City is a treasure trove of interesting history. It's too bad that the Central Subway took precedence over a Geary subway because, unless that Central Subway goes on to The Marina, it won't relieve the 30 Stockton bus and will have little use as just a Chinatown line. Between the time it takes to get from the Powell MUNI Station to the Union Sq Station and then the wait for a T streetcar, you can probably walk to Chinatown in about the same amount of time. It's only a 10 min walk. Now, a Geary subway probably won't happen for at least a generation or two. And yes, those MUNI platforms under Market St are very long for what MUNI uses them for. Back in the day (the 90s) when MUNI used to couple cars from several lines together in the tunnel, like a K, L and M train together, to be split up at West Portal, or a J and N train to be split up at Duboce, it seemed to make sense. As a frequent rider of the 38 Geary and 1 California buses, too bad they didn't construct a tunnel under Nob Hill and Lafayette Park along Sacramento St. for streetcars. Maybe that would have necessitated keeping a streetcar line into The Richmond. What could have been!!! Anyways, really good video both the commentary and the video scenes. You are very thorough and made sure to visualize everything you were talking about. I need to look for the gravestones in Buena Vista Park. I did not know about that!!
@@janettemcclelland2959 Exactly, that's because it isn't worth getting on the Central Subway just to have to get off in 5 min to get on the bus anyways. Might as well just get on the bus from the beginning and stay on it.
Truly fascinating. You answered so many questions I've had about the muni for decades. Loved it so much i watched it twice and sent it to like 10 other people. Great job!
The J-Church bypass going behind houses always reminds me of the “Alley El” segments of the Chicago L, where the elevated CTA tracks have segments that literally pass through alleyways behind houses
Great video! I love you included maps of the old lines. I didn't know there were so many lines back in the day. I very often drive by 15th St and San Bruno Ave, and always wonder why are there tracks there that lead to nowhere. Now I know maybe long time ago there was a street car line there. I personally love MUNI metro, being a teen in the 90's me and my friends were not about to pay for BART, with a fast pass we could get downtown faster, the zoo, or the movies at West Portal or Stonestown.
I'm a Brit and I live in the UK, but for a while I was working off and on in the Bay and I love the SF streetcar system. I would ride it regularly. And Delores Park was a regular hangout so I know that hydrant, Church Hill, and the diversion well. My home city of Leeds removed its streetcars in the 50s. There was a plan to reintroduce them as a rapid transit system but was shelved due to budget issues. It means Leeds is now the largest city in Europe without a rapid transit system. I wish we had the systems that SF has.
The Leeds budget problem is shared by SF. There is no local money for new Municipal Railway or BART projects. This leaves federal money as the only way to finance major transit improvements. Yet federal money today is spent on brand new light-rail systems in various auto-oriented cities around the country. These new lines are underutilized and may one day be abandoned or become tourist attractions.
@@Stilicho19801 That's not entirely true. Those systems are usually built in areas that are already pretty dense and that were built around some old electric streetcar system to begin with. In most cases, those cities also commit to dense development around those new light rail lines. For example, Portland built a pretty incredible system from scratch! San Diego did a pretty good job of it too. Unfortunately, SF and San Jose refused to add more density round their light rail lines. This is the kiss of death for many systems of this kind. You need a ton of usually young people who want to take transit to make these kinds of systems viable in modern day America. That's why SF is often being deprioritized. If we refuse to add 4-5 story buildings around our lines then they aren't viewed as particularly viable. San Jose is getting the short end of the stick here with their system. SF at least had some existing density to work with. SJ had none and failed to add any to make the light rail system viable.
"...a wave of corruption scandals involving United Railroads led voters to pass a bond measure to create a Municipal Railway (City owned and run)..." The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Damn , San Francisco looks so , so cool. I’d love to visit or live there. What a interesting city. Philadelphia has incredible history but it’s really, really bad. Dirty. Violent. And too differing in its neighborhoods’ quality of life, not for a good outcome .
so of course I had to subscribe to the channel and go & see what else is up there - and this is it?! this can't have been the first video produced by this channel. Its been up for a decade, and there's absolutely nothing on it. Someone's holding out ... ;-)
Muni used to be a 3 car train with the old Boeing cars. The overweight Breda cars introduced in the 1990s forces two car operation. Now the new Siemens cars are light enough to restore 3 car ops if demand calls for it. The stairways at Forest Hills was used to mimic a NYC subway station for the movie "Milk" in the scene where Harvey met his partner. I lived in West Portal (actually between WP and FH) and lived through two Twin Peak Tunnel shutdowns which lasted each about a year each. That lack of planning forcing people back into their cars or slow buses was one of the reasons I left SF after 16 years for NYC.
Weren't those shutdowns when they were building the subway connection to the Twin Peaks tunnel? IIRC they had to create an elevated entrance and exit for the KLM before Castro so they could still operate.
@@janettemcclelland2959 No there were recent shutdowns. The Twin Peaks tunnel work to go underground happened in the early 1970s with the construction of the BART tunnel under Market. The FH and WP stations have been able to handle KLM trains for decades.
@@lohphat As in Fix-It Week? And it never gets fixed! They're always trying to fix the overhead between Castro and West Portal. It's always had dead spots where the power goes on and off for as long as I can remember(since the early 60's). And other things. And let's not forget when the entire train system was shut down during the pandemic.
@@janettemcclelland2959 The first year shutdown was to replace the tracks. Then 2-3 after it reopened they closed it AGAIN to replace the overhead catenary. They couldn't have done both at the same time? 🙄
Tunnels and private rights-of-way also saved some other old trolley systems, like those of Boston and Philadelphia. Street running was the real trolley killer. It must be significant that most of the light-rail construction of the last half-century, in the US and Canada at least, tries to avoid street running as much as possible.
The E branch of the Boston Green Line going from Heath Street to Symphony still runs as a streetcar, even though the rest is light rail/subway nowadays.
Great video. I like riding to the inner sunset on the N, and enjoy being above ground so I can see the city. I don’t go to the outer by train, walk or bike only.
nah I don't think San Francisco needs a "subway", it'd be better off with some new underground (or elevated) tramways to replace above ground bus service in a similar fashion to the London Dockland's Light Railway or the existing Municipal Railway...
Excellent historical review of the once extensive streetcar system in SF. Agree that Geary blvd would benefit from a surface based solution or subway (more expensive option). I’d urge you to do a cable car line historical review and comment on a possible extension of the California street cable car line to Fillmore or all the way to the Presidio. Service to the Fillmore would enhance the line and anchor both ends to a commercial area.
The California Cable Cars did run all the way out to Presidio, but were cut back due to low ridership and because crossing Van Ness is a logistical nightmare. It was considered best to just lop it off at Van Ness! I too wish they would run it back out to the Ocean! We can dream, can't we?
Your video is excellent! Well researched and clearly explained. As a fellow native San Franciscan I'm proud and appreciative of the wonderfully well planned public transportation we enjoy, especially the hardworking streetcars. Good job !
Great video. It has always perplexed me why Market St stations were so large for only 2 car trains. On another note, is it Geary Blvd or Geary St ... and do you know where it breaks off?
Great content! Instant sub. Perhaps more on the potential for an extension of central subway to the Marina or *more importantly* what a future Geary BART line would look like?
Excellent video. I really enjoyed it. Great job! I hope you upload more videos to this channel. Yes, I agree there should be a subway built underneath Geary Boulevard for BART or MUNI.
Terrific video! With today's transportation costs and schedules (as seen by the Central Subway), well, I can appreciate a Geary Subway, but I'd prefer a light rail running up through the Sunset across the Richmond through the Presidio over to the Marina connecting with the F-line. And another light rail along Geary. (And another running across the Bridge into Sausalito and Marin)
Really great video, I learned a lot even as a resident. Thank you! I personally am grateful for public transportation, and like the mixed above/underground MUNI, but at the same time would like to see a unified system. Geary line 100%
I think SF made a good use case for Light Rail and demonstrated the vehicle's flexibility. A citywide BART would be cool but the amount of infrastructure would have changed much of it, you can see what Balboa Park did to that neighborhood. I think Metro fits seamlessly into the fabric of the city and it's like having a community train with the station on your street or in front of your steps with a one-seat ride to the subway.
Love this video. i agree with your last statement on Geary subway 😂 muni should have put the central subway extension to fisherman’s wharf on the ballot years ago when voters first approved Phase 2 in the early 2000s. We are still years away from being out on the ballot despite the tunnels already there…
I moved away from SF 15 years ago. I just found out about the billion dollar N-S downtown subway. I would never have thought they even needed that, certainly not as much as something on tracks on (or under or a combo) Geary. The diesel buses roar up and down Geary continually.
@@emjayay Geary makes a lot of sense. Originally the plan was to build Geary subway, T line Subway/light rail and Van Ness subway. We got stuck with an above ground T line for Phase 1, Van Ness converted to BRT and Central Subway was added and approved because light rail crossing through downtown makes no sense given the existing gridlock. Geary subway was once again traded for a some red paint and transit lanes.
This is so cool! I lived in oceanview/ingleside for a year, right on the M line on Randolph, and would commute to the Castro daily on muni. This answers so many questions, and I had always wondered what the open section was leading into Castro station. I had no idea it was a ghost station! Hearing the muni sounds gave me major nostalgia
Thanks for this amazing deep dive into SF history. I’d love to support you for more content like this. What are your plans for this channel in the future and have you thought about a Patreon or tip jar?
Indeed, this is a good history. Out of curiosity could the Market Street bypass lines be used to move any of the Breda LRVs onto the E and F surface lines for preservation? I think its a shame San Francisco did not keep a Boeing SLRV set in the heritage fleet, and I think it would be nice to preserve some of the Bredas, and use them with the other heritage streetcars, given their iconic 1990s design which still looks modern even by contemporary standards (although I also like the new Siemens LRVs and hope they are preserved as well).
What a wonderful documentary! I never realized these lines, and it's history when I visited San Francisco. If not for the social situation, San Fran is really one of my big heart places in the US.
On the N line, the abandoned station was named Eureka St, not Eureka Valley. I photographed its sidewalk entrance portals in 1970 but lost the photos. Fascinating video and history!
I actually like the hybrid, reduces costs significantly. In France they built metro lines under areas where it’s not possible to expand the road and have it go to a separated fast lane on the surface, where there is enough space. They don’t use any cables on the surface - inside the metro it’s attached to the lines and outside it has special charging pads, at the station, on the ground, to which it is attaching while stationed for fast charging. During tourist season or school months, they just add a few more tramway wagons at the end to deal with the influx of people - great for costs and for traffic.
This proves historic streetcar and interurban radial railways can be modernized and upgraded , a better more profitable option than scrapping and decommissioning
This is an absolutely brilliant explication of how five original Muni streetcar lines survived. A couple of notes, though, to clarify. First, Muni did intend to replace the J-Church in the early 1950s with electric trolley buses, which could easily climb Church Street itself, bypassing the, er, bypass. Neighborhood opposition squelched that. Second, BART never intended to establish a "second, local BART service inside the city". The Muni Metro subway level downtown, and its extension to Castro, was always to be part of Muni, and was included to get San Franciscans to vote for the BART bonds. In 1966, Muni asked voters to approve more bonds to make the Muni subway level a true Metro, including only the M and N lines, and putting the outer ends of those lines underground. But voters did not approve. That's how all five lines, the J, K, L, M, and N, ended up in the subway.
bart originally was going to go through the richmond and to marin until marin dropped out
@@ababababaababbba Yes, but not through the second level of the Market subway. As always with BART, that was supposed to just be a spur off the main line. BART does this all throughout its system. The way the spurs all interline is supposed to match commuting patterns. BART brings people from out in the suburbs to denser and denser areas with the lines interlining more and more to eventually all join together in the Transbay Tunnel. The idea was that the BART lines would do the same in reverse once they reached SF. But we stopped funding BART so we only got half a system.
Ugh, that crazy interlining pattern is still the transit mistake of the century! I understand that every SF NIMBY wants _his_ train to go all way downtown through the tunnel. But every single transit engineer that they asked told them that this interlining was an idiotic idea.
As always, SF caved to the loudest activists and allowed this ridiculous service pattern that hobbles Muni to this day. I know that the T will now run into the Central Subway instead. And they seem to be intent on moving the single-car J onto the surface alignment on Market. And just maybe the L will be rerouted to Balboa Park instead of the tunnel. But that subway is still at least two lines too interlined. With street-running trams that get stuck in car traffic, the last thing you want to make them do is to interline in a complicated ballet of the absurd to all cram into one single tunnel. The fact that Muni still does these crazy maneuvers all these years later is insane!
Thank you for clarifying that. Out of curiosity is there any concept art for how the Muni Metro would have looked had it been implemented as a heavy rail system?
@@ababababaababbba Yes I recall reading that, and wasn’t there talk of a second transbay tube paralleling the Golden Gate Bridge?
To be fair, it is entirely possible ot have fast frequent service on surface level street cars, and many cities do it. The trick is to give these systems their own lane seperate from private motor traffic. Considering that there are two lanes of traffic and two for parking on most roads, along major public transport routes all you would have to do is turn the two parking lanes into private traffic lanes, and let the trams and buses have their own dedicated lanes on the street. It is a quick and very cheap fix for a massive improvement on public transport. If you want to take it a step further, you do what Zürich has done for decades, and other cities have also implemented, where traffic lights automatically stop cross traffic when a tram/bus is approaching so that public transport never stops at lights. At the end of the day its just a matter of priorities, and in the US public transit is unfortunately very far down on the list.
Thank you for saving me the time of making a similar point.
And, for the love of god, don’t have your trains stop at stop signs. Prevent cross streets from running through if you have to. Every time I watch a Muni line operating in mixed traffic, I die a little.
Oh god!God!! Really!! San Francisco has twice the population of Zurich and occupies a quarter of the land mass. If you are going to be critical, educate yourself. Hell, San Francisco is not even the biggest city in the Bay Area. Don't be dumb.
@@vpolite1 huh? If anything what you just said just makes his point more valid
Checkout Manchester, UK which has a system which runs on the street in the city and streetcars but is a rapid transit system on its own network out of town.
The production value of this is INSANE for an 83-sub channel!
what is an "83-sub channel"?
@@Yowzoechannel with 83 subscribers
7 days later and now it has 1.73K subscribers :D
114k views in 3 weeks. Looking forward to what the future holds!
Great video, I think a lot of the "wistfulness" for the streetcar era more harkens back to a time when people and cities actually cared about having good public transit infrastructure that, you know, worked for the public to maintain a sense of walkability. It's an ethos that most american cities (SF is a rare exception) have lost, by way of turning many streetcar routes into bus services then cutting those buses to provide infrastructure for cars. American cities used to have some of the best public transit infrastructure in the world, and now we just don't seem to care much anymore.
The thing is, america always goes with whatever is cheapest. When they were in their heyday, streetcars were simply the cheapest option for cities to maintain vs infrastructure for expensive cars, which very few people owned. It’s sad, but it’s true that once more people could get cars, it was simply cheaper for cities to cater to them
@@Shinyarc It isnt tho, check out the suburban growth ponzi scheme by not just bikes
@@Shinyarc it’s not cheapest. At least not in the long term. Generally American politicians make decisions based on what companies lobby them the hardest, not what is more affordable or good for the American people
Great video! Your next one should be on unbuilt BART lines/projects like Marin County, Market Street (as you wonderfully alluded to here) a second bay crossing to name but a few...
Here in Toronto...we were lucky that we kept most of our streetcar system. It's good to see San Francisco also kept some of their line....
As someone who lives on Dolores and uses the J regularly, this vid is great. Imo the J and N should be combined as complete streetcar line, that way there can be less jams and more frequency on the other lines in the market street subway, they can just transfer to the subway at Church station. Also couldn't agree more about Geary street (and tbh also Van Ness, Sunset, and 19th Ave could also use a subway)
Fantastic video. Living in the inner Sunset district, I use to ride the N Judah all the time through the sunset tunnel to go downtown. I also miss taking the 38 Geary bus out to 48th avenue and Cabrillo street to Playland
Nobody in their right mind would have wanted to scrap the street car system. Especially if you considered replacing it with a more expensive BART system.
The advantage of the street car system is that it is an on and off system. You get on on street level and off on street level.
Man, as someone living in the UK, I had _no idea_ just how darned _pretty_ San Francisco really is! Especially in the bright sun! It's made me realise just how little footage I've actually seen of San Fran, other than the classic "here's a quick look at a really steep street and an old-timey cable car". It clearly has _so_ much character and is actually a genuinely _good looking_ city, which is a really hard thing to achieve even with modern developments and more modern cities. Plus it looks like there's lots of green spaces and parks around with some really _fantastic_ views!! I'm rather jealous now. I live in a relatively flat, large-ish town, mostly consisting of similar/identical brick houses and not much else - and even where there _are_ hills there isn't much to see/look at and definitely none of the views you fine folks get!
Yes it's wonderful! Come visit sometime, it's not nearly as bad as everyone tries to make it out to be
It certainly makes an impression on me pretty much every time I walk through it. Seemingly one of the few US cities I've been to where I can get around almost entirely on walking and public transit, and gives you the views for doing it too.
@@sonicwave32 Yes, you nailed it! I've lived here since 1984 and I still feel this way.
@@sunshineyellow How much poop do you encounter on a daily basis?
@@sunshineyellow The thing to remember is that "everyone" is just a very loud but small segment of our population who have never been to the city before and should be ignored.
Excellent explanation of how we got today’s streetcars/subway hybrid. I love the segues into local history (the fire hydrant, the gravestones, the Eureka Valley "ghost” station) too!
I remember going past Eureka Valley station at Castro when I was a kid.
Streetcar/lightrail hybrids are actually a perfect, flexible solution. Easily accessible, decent capacity, no need for expensive infrastructure where it's not necessary (and it can be gradually improved), relatively cheap to build & run (which makes it feasible to operate a dense network, which in turn improves accessibility and overall door-to-door speed), ...
So if you don't need the capacity of a full-fledged subway this is a perfectly fine way to build public transport.
But even if you do build a subway, on-street public transport can still be a valuable supplement for local trips/the "last mile".
E.g. here in Vienna we made the mistake of ripping out streetcar routes when we built our subway; now the subway is overcrowded in some sections with people only going 1-2 stops, which would actually have been faster before in the streetcar (simply because of the subway's longer access way from street level to platform and the lower station density overall).
Also: There are multiple solutions if your streetcars get stuck in traffic. Separate lanes, priorization at traffic lights (or even priorization of car traffic/gatekeeper signals, to clear the road ahead of the streetcar), ... it's only a question of priorities.
Making on-street public transport more attractive also generally reduces traffic delays, even for motorists (simply because a passenger in a bus or streetcar only takes up a fraction of the space compared to cars; and because the vehicles are in operation all day, and not parked - still taking up valuable space - for 20+ hours).
Americans love using confusing terminology.. Light rail (streetcars) can be used for street, dedicated right of way and subway operations using the same rolling stock. There is no difference as light rail is very versatile.
There's a distinction among light rail, heavy rail, heavy rail/rapid transit, and heavy rail/commuter rail. The term _light rail_ was coined in 1972 by the U.S. Urban Mass Transportation Administration (UMTA; the precursor to the Federal Transit Administration) to describe new streetcar transformations that were taking place in Europe and the United States.
@@RaymondHng - I know the term light rail was coined in 1972 by by the U.S. Urban Mass Transportation Administration as to give a new term for 'streetcars' despite the fact trams/streetcars are light rail operations which have been operating in various guises since 1807 when the first horse-drawn passenger tramway started operation in Wales(UK). The word 'tramway' was the early version of light rail.
@@chrismckellar9350 In North America, the term _tram_ is more likely to be understood as an aerial tramway or a people-mover. Unlike other languages such as Spanish and French, there is no international governing body that regulates use of the English language.
@@RaymondHng - The word tram is 'British' English as mentioned, first coined in 1807 as a term for what we mow know as light rail.
Growing up in San Francisco in the 70's I remember watching the transition from the old streetcar system to the newer light rail style. We were completely amazed by the moving stairs in the LRV's.
Me too. We would always come to San Francisco to visit family back then,and I remember when they transitioned from the old PCC cars to the Boeing LRV and the Metro. Took a long time for folks to get used to.
Really well done video! Thought I knew everything about streetcar history in SF but learned quite a few new things! Looking forward to more transit history content 👍😃
SF native here --- excellent video. Keep it up.
Most streetcars in Bratislava are separated, even in the city center. Running on the surface is not the problem. Nor is running through pedestrian zones. Running with cars is a problem and it can be solved super easily. Btw. very nice video, I learned something new about the SF system. I hope one day I will visit SF.
4:52 The old unburnt side reminds me of Boston while the new rebuilt side has New York City vibes. Definitely the unburnt side is more charming and therefore more cherished.
8:58 I think not building the BART Geary Street Tunnel was a mistake. It could have been the beginning of a second transbay tube!
EDIT: I think San Francisco's hills are also why the city's trolleybusses/trackless trolleys survived. Boston recently got rid of theirs this past March! It was big mistake IMO.
Geary as a BART subway (rather than Muni), in conjunction with the second Transbay Tube, is very much on the proverbial table right now with the Link21 project.
@@peteralbert1485 That's good to hear! 👍
Many of the electric trolleybus lines in San Francisco where once streetcar lines.
originally the plan was to have Bart service through the Richmond and possibly a crossing to Marin by modifying the Golden Gate Bridge with a lower deck
Say it louder for the people in the back, a subway under Geary Boulevard is the number one piece of infrastructure that SF needs
Its telling that bart's inital design document included a geary street subway that went down 19th st. Hopefully the city and BART can reexamine and make it a reality.
As a transit planner I like the franken system - it provides good local coverage in the suburbs and grade separation and capacity down town.
Full grade separation in the burbs would have led to less frequent stations and less vibrancy, access and activity
Market Street is now prohibiting private vehicular traffic east of 10th Street. This allows only buses, trolleybuses, and the F Market streetcar line to run on the surface of Market Street. The K Ingleside, L Taraval, M Oceanview, and N Judah run on tracks in semi-dedicated-to-dedicated lanes on city surface streets. Parts of the M and N also run on full grade separated tracks in the outlying areas.
@@RaymondHng : "M Oceanview, and N Judah run on tracks in semi-dedicated-to-dedicated lanes on city surface streets" Uhhhhh no. Only PARTLY true.
The M only is on private ROW from St. Francis Circle to the intersection of 19th Avenue and Junipero Serra. From there it travels on shared streets in the Oceanview where the M is slow as shiite.
The N is only private ROW at 9th and Judah to 19th Avenue and Judah where it goes back to sharing Judah with autos though there are signs telling autos to stay off the N tracks.
As a side note: many many eons ago, I was doing my graduate work at SFSU and working as an office monkey in the Financial District. I used to actually hop onto the M Oceanview TO Balboa Park station where I would transfer to a BART train headed to the Embarcadero Station and the office. Believe it or not, BART plus the M through Oceanview to SFSU was USUALLY faster than M through Twin Peaks tunnel to SFSU.
Aren’t the main suburbs across the bridge? It would be nice if they ran the light rail down the other bridges like they did before.
That`s a great story about tram in a big hilly city. And, what the most precious in this story - tram survived and his network is developing now.
Here in my country capital city, Kyiv, Ukraine, some steepest lines were demolished "to make space for cars". Projects of tram tunnels were made, but not realised.
Idk, you can have both streetcars and subway. And you can have a subway line and a streetcar line on the same street, you see that quite frequently with the trams and U-Bahn in Berlin for example. Trams usually have one or two more stops between the U-Bahn stations and so kind of function like Local/Express
We have that on Market St. Double decker subway underneath and The F heritage street car route above it in some dedicated lanes and is quite popular with tourists and commuters. Part of Market St closed off to cars a couple years ago to improve reliability of transit.
I’ve always said BART should have served more than just market st, now I know there was a plan at one point so thanks for the history!
This is such a fantastic and incredible video. Thank you for putting so much effort into it.
Love the firefighter supervisor to fire hydrant shot! Video is awesome. Please make more SF history videos!
Tbh,as a kid, I loved the old green Muni streetcars. The Key System in the East Bay was long gone before I was born, so taking BART over to SF to ride the Muni was always an adventure. As an adult now, I'd much rather take the Muni than driving and trying to find parking. This video really took me back in time.
This looks like your first video and it was very well done. Hoping for more of this content!
I like the current MUNI trains and glad for the expansion.
I never comment on videos but:
Absolutely amazing. 10/10. Fantastic content. History, rail, and transit - I feel like this video was made for me. Subscribed. Looking forward to future videos!
great video! love learning about SF history :)
Dude, this is so cool to learn the lore behind the streetcars. We really live in a special place. That tip about why Castro's platforms are so ridiculously long blew my mind. Love this stuff.
Also yes, Geary needs a streetcar sooooo bad oml the Richmond needs that so bad!
Hi from Melbourne, Australia. We also never lost our tram system which is the largest tram network in the world with around 250km (150mi) of track. Trams have priority on the road and cars behind or alongside the tram must stop when it does. I wouldn't swap our trams for anything.
Former Liberal Premier Sir Henry Bolte wanted to close Melbourne's tram system, but couldn't because the Victorian Government didn't own it. He did unfortunately manage to rip up the Bendigo and Ballarat systems in 1970 because the Vic government did own them (via the State Electricity Commission).
@@ktipuss Didn't know that. The Libs seem to have always been anti-PT.
Exceptional video-thank you for producing this. I’ve lived here my whole life and didn’t know some of these tidbits!
Aside from a Geary subway, we need Divis/Castro from the Marina to Noe Valley!
I moved to SF last year and I always enjoy learning new things about this city. Thank you for the informative video. I never really questioned why some lines are serviced by bus and others by street car (as well as the letter/number naming system) but it all makes more sense with context.
Many of the electric trolleybus lines in San Francisco where once streetcar lines.
I used to live on the N Judah line at Duboce Park and loved taking the Muni. Maybe it wasn’t super speedy on the surface streets but I loved the hybrid nature of the Muni. And to me it feels more sophisticated riding a streetcar like Muni than a bus, I’m not sure why
My parents lived at Duboce and Noe next to Duboce Park before I was born. Mom told me all the stories about the old days of Muni. I always rode the N to visit my dad when we were in town from LA. Still ride the N to this day.
Me too! On Scott across from what eventually became the Harvey Milk Community Center. My N Judah stop was right at the tunnel.
I always felt there was a specialness about the rounded streetcars, and as a little kid attending Mission Dolores I often used to ride on the back (outside), hanging on to the wire for dear life, from Dolores Park to Market Street…fair memories. Settled in those sagging green seats, hearing the clink of the coins deposited in the fare box or the sound of the fare card being punched by the driver, standing up to pull the cord, exiting down the rears steps through the folding doors… all visceral body memories :-)
There was a hierarchy of preference for me. I loved every thrilling cable car ride. Next were the green & creme streetcars with their clanking and occasional disconnects, then the electrified buses (the 22 was my regular), and finally the big old loud & rumbling (diesel?) bus lines slowly making their way.
@@Yowzoe My mom told me that she used to do the same thing through the Sunset Tunnel when she lived on Duboce with my dad before I was born. She did the same thing in LA with the Yellow Cars when she was a kid. I got to ride those as an infant right up to the last run in '63. I always remember how those old Muni cars would be heading through the Twin Peaks Tunnel,and right around Forest Hill,they would lose power. The pole always came off when the N would be making the turn onto Irving at 9th Ave. We stopped going to SF in the 70's after my mom remarried,but those were what I always remember about the old cars.
It's a beautiful city. It's nice to take it slow
Please keep making more of these videos. This is amazing. Thank you so much.
Such a great video! Can’t wait for more SF vids from you!
I don't own a car in SF. I rely on my bicyle and Muni. I love the Muni metro, the only thing I would change is honestly its frequency. The services could stand to be closer together. I rarely find the trains to be overly crowded with exception of the morning train to work which is during a peak rush hour time. Then I am usually required to stand until Embaracadero at which point I can sit but that is really a minor complaint for what is honestly a very nice way to get round. I do wish we'd retained some of those services above ground rail like they originally were over the bus system, though projects like the Van Ness Bus lanes do make it a bit easier to not fall victim to the traffic.
I dont pretend to haver all the information just my own observations as a resident.
I rode the old cars above ground on Market as a kid in the 60's and 70's before and during the construction of the subway. The service was usually frequent on weekdays. And the traffic on Market east of Van Ness often caused delays. And the first couple of years of the subway,it only ran on weekdays,the J still ran above ground on Market.
Bravo! This video blew my mind 4 or 5 times. Can't believe the the recycled headstones at buena vista or that Bart was planning on stopping at Castro Street! 🤯
I feel the same way, having grown up in SF.
This guy has made a compelling video with wonderful editing and fascinating history, and as many people have said, let's hope he continues :-)
Thanks for the informative history. Even though streetcars can get stuck in traffic, I think they're more energy efficient, don't pollute as much, require less maintenance, and last longer compared to buses.
And streetcars are just more pleasant to ride. I want to love buses because they cost relatively little to deploy and are flexible, but I simply don't like riding them. Market Street has both busses and streetcars, and I'll literally watch the busses go by and wait so I can take a streetcar.
Track maintenance is almost as much as busses, and they require a lot of electrically to run. They are changing one carbon for another carbon, electrically does not come out of thin air. I happen to like the streetcars but they are just another mode of transportation not more or less anything then busses.
@@scotttild The whole *_"changing one carbon for another carbon"_* argument is deliberately misleading and has got to *STOP* now. It totally ignores the massive improvements currently being made to the power grid. On April 30, 2022 California for the first time ran on 100% clean energy with solar making up the largest slice.
@scotttild I think the streetcars themselves are less maintenance than busses and last longer, and I've read differently on the energy consumption on using electric versus diesel (or at least electric is not putting out as much smoke close to you). I'm comparing to diesel busses of course, not electric or alternative fuel.
@@scotttild Where I live, power is generated through hydroelectricity.
Good transit content AND fun facts about the city I didn't know? Definitely worth a sub
this is probably why hilly Lisbon's trolleys survived, too, although being piss poor also helped to avoid an "upgrade".
Amazing video! I’ve visited SF and all of the transit lines amazed/confused me. Great info and some great history tidbits!
Wonderful! I thought I knew a lot about MUNI, but this is a great perspective and history. Subscribing!
Pre-pandemic, my family used to travel to San Francisco a lot, and I was always eager to ride the streetcars as a railfan myself. We look forward to going back there sometime in the near future!
~A fan from the Philippines 🇵🇭
Pinoy to kabayan, Ive been here since 94 but frequent traveller to PI, SF have change a lot ,too much homelessness and drugs (legal to shoot heroin) in the street especially the Tenderloin District, other parts are doing well and big development in the south of market (Mission Bay where the Warriors arena located and big hospitals...much better now after 3 years of pandemic but still financial district is slow (still lots of work at home so those buildings are just 40% occupied..
Amazing stuff, keep it up! Love learning local history
Good video. Growing up taking the metro in the 80s, I recall muni ran 4 and 6 car trains in the Market St tunnel with L, M, and K trains decoupling into 2 car trains at west portal and J and N trains decoupling into 2 car trains at Duboce Ave.
Yes, and the coupling and linking the electronics was always a disaster as were the whole Boeing Vertol cars. At West Portal going downtown they used to practically crash them into each other, sometimes more than once.
@@emjayay Yep. The Boeing trains were crap. The doors always malfunctioned. As did the stairs when it would come in/out of the tunnel. And the AC often didn't work. I remember when they would couple the K/L/M all the way to West Portal,then separate them off. I wish the N ran 3-car trains,but the platforms on Judah/Irving/Carl St aren't long enough to accommodate them.
Amazing video! Really happy to see a transit-focused video of San Francisco. Can't wait for more!
Great video! I love the hydrant that saved San Francisco, or at least that section. I live in Baltimore & remember before living there the street car lines. The dependence on the automobile and the bus killed what could have been a very good transit system. Thank you for posting and all the best.
I used to go to SF on weekends and would often overshoot my downtown Van Ness stop to ride the metro for fun. The transitions between the central underground section and aboveground sections are quite special IMO. The train just stops there while the steps slowly move into position, and suddenly you go from fairly normal subway right onto the tight, hilly streets of SF, and every so often move off the street again to grade-separated sections. It's cool to see some of the history visualized and to learn that these transitions were also what helped keep the metro in place. Definitely looking forward to you making more content about Fog City history!
Excellent video! I did know that the streetcar line letters came from the old Muni streetcars but I didn't know that the bus line numbers came from the Market St RR. That's pretty cool. I do love how you weaved SF history into the story. The City is a treasure trove of interesting history. It's too bad that the Central Subway took precedence over a Geary subway because, unless that Central Subway goes on to The Marina, it won't relieve the 30 Stockton bus and will have little use as just a Chinatown line. Between the time it takes to get from the Powell MUNI Station to the Union Sq Station and then the wait for a T streetcar, you can probably walk to Chinatown in about the same amount of time. It's only a 10 min walk. Now, a Geary subway probably won't happen for at least a generation or two.
And yes, those MUNI platforms under Market St are very long for what MUNI uses them for. Back in the day (the 90s) when MUNI used to couple cars from several lines together in the tunnel, like a K, L and M train together, to be split up at West Portal, or a J and N train to be split up at Duboce, it seemed to make sense.
As a frequent rider of the 38 Geary and 1 California buses, too bad they didn't construct a tunnel under Nob Hill and Lafayette Park along Sacramento St. for streetcars. Maybe that would have necessitated keeping a streetcar line into The Richmond. What could have been!!! Anyways, really good video both the commentary and the video scenes. You are very thorough and made sure to visualize everything you were talking about. I need to look for the gravestones in Buena Vista Park. I did not know about that!!
And even with the Central Subway the 8,30 and 45 on Stockton are STILL overcrowded.
@@janettemcclelland2959 Exactly, that's because it isn't worth getting on the Central Subway just to have to get off in 5 min to get on the bus anyways. Might as well just get on the bus from the beginning and stay on it.
@@bryanCJC2105 True. Especially if I'm going to get off the 8,30 or 45 at Market & Stockton.
Truly fascinating. You answered so many questions I've had about the muni for decades. Loved it so much i watched it twice and sent it to like 10 other people. Great job!
Cool video, I love SF transportation. I found this very informative. Thank you.
You do a great service in the tribute and attention you pay to the details that have woven the urban fabric of your city. Really enjoyed the content.
The J-Church bypass going behind houses always reminds me of the “Alley El” segments of the Chicago L, where the elevated CTA tracks have segments that literally pass through alleyways behind houses
Great video! I love you included maps of the old lines. I didn't know there were so many lines back in the day. I very often drive by 15th St and San Bruno Ave, and always wonder why are there tracks there that lead to nowhere. Now I know maybe long time ago there was a street car line there. I personally love MUNI metro, being a teen in the 90's me and my friends were not about to pay for BART, with a fast pass we could get downtown faster, the zoo, or the movies at West Portal or Stonestown.
I'm a Brit and I live in the UK, but for a while I was working off and on in the Bay and I love the SF streetcar system. I would ride it regularly. And Delores Park was a regular hangout so I know that hydrant, Church Hill, and the diversion well. My home city of Leeds removed its streetcars in the 50s. There was a plan to reintroduce them as a rapid transit system but was shelved due to budget issues. It means Leeds is now the largest city in Europe without a rapid transit system. I wish we had the systems that SF has.
The Leeds budget problem is shared by SF. There is no local money for new Municipal Railway or BART projects. This leaves federal money as the only way to finance major transit improvements. Yet federal money today is spent on brand new light-rail systems in various auto-oriented cities around the country. These new lines are underutilized and may one day be abandoned or become tourist attractions.
@@Stilicho19801 That's not entirely true. Those systems are usually built in areas that are already pretty dense and that were built around some old electric streetcar system to begin with. In most cases, those cities also commit to dense development around those new light rail lines. For example, Portland built a pretty incredible system from scratch! San Diego did a pretty good job of it too.
Unfortunately, SF and San Jose refused to add more density round their light rail lines. This is the kiss of death for many systems of this kind. You need a ton of usually young people who want to take transit to make these kinds of systems viable in modern day America.
That's why SF is often being deprioritized. If we refuse to add 4-5 story buildings around our lines then they aren't viewed as particularly viable. San Jose is getting the short end of the stick here with their system. SF at least had some existing density to work with. SJ had none and failed to add any to make the light rail system viable.
"...a wave of corruption scandals involving United Railroads led voters to pass a bond measure to create a Municipal Railway (City owned and run)..." The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Damn , San Francisco looks so , so cool. I’d love to visit or live there. What a interesting city. Philadelphia has incredible history but it’s really, really bad. Dirty. Violent. And too differing in its neighborhoods’ quality of life, not for a good outcome .
Jesus, that was a long intro for a video about a Geary st. metro extension.
so of course I had to subscribe to the channel and go & see what else is up there - and this is it?! this can't have been the first video produced by this channel. Its been up for a decade, and there's absolutely nothing on it. Someone's holding out ... ;-)
This was an incredibly fun watch! please make more videos in the future.
Muni used to be a 3 car train with the old Boeing cars. The overweight Breda cars introduced in the 1990s forces two car operation. Now the new Siemens cars are light enough to restore 3 car ops if demand calls for it.
The stairways at Forest Hills was used to mimic a NYC subway station for the movie "Milk" in the scene where Harvey met his partner.
I lived in West Portal (actually between WP and FH) and lived through two Twin Peak Tunnel shutdowns which lasted each about a year each. That lack of planning forcing people back into their cars or slow buses was one of the reasons I left SF after 16 years for NYC.
Weren't those shutdowns when they were building the subway connection to the Twin Peaks tunnel? IIRC they had to create an elevated entrance and exit for the KLM before Castro so they could still operate.
@@janettemcclelland2959 No there were recent shutdowns. The Twin Peaks tunnel work to go underground happened in the early 1970s with the construction of the BART tunnel under Market. The FH and WP stations have been able to handle KLM trains for decades.
@@lohphat As in Fix-It Week? And it never gets fixed! They're always trying to fix the overhead between Castro and West Portal. It's always had dead spots where the power goes on and off for as long as I can remember(since the early 60's). And other things. And let's not forget when the entire train system was shut down during the pandemic.
@@janettemcclelland2959 The first year shutdown was to replace the tracks. Then 2-3 after it reopened they closed it AGAIN to replace the overhead catenary.
They couldn't have done both at the same time? 🙄
@@lohphat I know right? Muni being Muni.
I knew all of this stuff already because I too am fascinated by SF's streetcars, but the video is great nonetheless!
Tunnels and private rights-of-way also saved some other old trolley systems, like those of Boston and Philadelphia. Street running was the real trolley killer. It must be significant that most of the light-rail construction of the last half-century, in the US and Canada at least, tries to avoid street running as much as possible.
Very interesting never knew this information. Thanks. But now I do..
excited for more videos!
The E branch of the Boston Green Line going from Heath Street to Symphony still runs as a streetcar, even though the rest is light rail/subway nowadays.
Really well done for a new video! Also great to see a city that isn't always talked about like London or NYC or something
Lovely video! Looking forward to more 😃. My favorite thing was learning what that tunnel next to the Castro was for.
Also Geary subway when!!!!
Very informative. Thanks for your hard work on this video.
Great Video! reminds me of Jay Foreman's Unfinished London series, in a good way!
Great video. I like riding to the inner sunset on the N, and enjoy being above ground so I can see the city. I don’t go to the outer by train, walk or bike only.
Gotta keep the streetcars but also build a subway
Light rail (streetcars) can be used for street, dedicated right of way and subway operations using the same rolling stock. There is no difference.
nah I don't think San Francisco needs a "subway", it'd be better off with some new underground (or elevated) tramways to replace above ground bus service in a similar fashion to the London Dockland's Light Railway or the existing Municipal Railway...
The UA-cam recommendation algorithm is coming in clutch. Just moved to SF recently and really enjoy this historical overview!
Excellent historical review of the once extensive streetcar system in SF. Agree that Geary blvd would benefit from a surface based solution or subway (more expensive option). I’d urge you to do a cable car line historical review and comment on a possible extension of the California street cable car line to Fillmore or all the way to the Presidio. Service to the Fillmore would enhance the line and anchor both ends to a commercial area.
The California Cable Cars did run all the way out to Presidio, but were cut back due to low ridership and because crossing Van Ness is a logistical nightmare. It was considered best to just lop it off at Van Ness! I too wish they would run it back out to the Ocean! We can dream, can't we?
Love this! I learned so much!
Your video is excellent! Well researched and clearly explained. As a fellow native San Franciscan I'm proud and appreciative of the wonderfully well planned public transportation we enjoy, especially the hardworking streetcars. Good job !
Great video. It has always perplexed me why Market St stations were so large for only 2 car trains. On another note, is it Geary Blvd or Geary St ... and do you know where it breaks off?
I think of Van Ness as the dividing line: to the east it's Geary Street, to the west it's Geary Boulevard.
Can we get more content in the near future please and thanks
This is a great video, I knew nothing about the San Francisco street cars before watching. I was fascinated.
Great content! Instant sub. Perhaps more on the potential for an extension of central subway to the Marina or *more importantly* what a future Geary BART line would look like?
Excellent video. I really enjoyed it. Great job! I hope you upload more videos to this channel. Yes, I agree there should be a subway built underneath Geary Boulevard for BART or MUNI.
Terrific video! With today's transportation costs and schedules (as seen by the Central Subway), well, I can appreciate a Geary Subway, but I'd prefer a light rail running up through the Sunset across the Richmond through the Presidio over to the Marina connecting with the F-line. And another light rail along Geary. (And another running across the Bridge into Sausalito and Marin)
Really great video, I learned a lot even as a resident. Thank you!
I personally am grateful for public transportation, and like the mixed above/underground MUNI, but at the same time would like to see a unified system. Geary line 100%
I think SF made a good use case for Light Rail and demonstrated the vehicle's flexibility. A citywide BART would be cool but the amount of infrastructure would have changed much of it, you can see what Balboa Park did to that neighborhood. I think Metro fits seamlessly into the fabric of the city and it's like having a community train with the station on your street or in front of your steps with a one-seat ride to the subway.
Pretty high-quality first video, also (just so I know for sure) is this channel supposed to revolve around the history of San Francisco by chance?
Love this video. i agree with your last statement on Geary subway 😂 muni should have put the central subway extension to fisherman’s wharf on the ballot years ago when voters first approved Phase 2 in the early 2000s. We are still years away from being out on the ballot despite the tunnels already there…
I moved away from SF 15 years ago. I just found out about the billion dollar N-S downtown subway. I would never have thought they even needed that, certainly not as much as something on tracks on (or under or a combo) Geary. The diesel buses roar up and down Geary continually.
@@emjayay Geary makes a lot of sense. Originally the plan was to build Geary subway, T line Subway/light rail and Van Ness subway. We got stuck with an above ground T line for Phase 1, Van Ness converted to BRT and Central Subway was added and approved because light rail crossing through downtown makes no sense given the existing gridlock. Geary subway was once again traded for a some red paint and transit lanes.
This is so cool! I lived in oceanview/ingleside for a year, right on the M line on Randolph, and would commute to the Castro daily on muni. This answers so many questions, and I had always wondered what the open section was leading into Castro station. I had no idea it was a ghost station! Hearing the muni sounds gave me major nostalgia
Thanks for this amazing deep dive into SF history. I’d love to support you for more content like this. What are your plans for this channel in the future and have you thought about a Patreon or tip jar?
Indeed, this is a good history. Out of curiosity could the Market Street bypass lines be used to move any of the Breda LRVs onto the E and F surface lines for preservation? I think its a shame San Francisco did not keep a Boeing SLRV set in the heritage fleet, and I think it would be nice to preserve some of the Bredas, and use them with the other heritage streetcars, given their iconic 1990s design which still looks modern even by contemporary standards (although I also like the new Siemens LRVs and hope they are preserved as well).
Bredas are falling apart at the moment. Lots of mechanical issues. Maybe if they were able to completely restore them.
The Boeing LRVs have had issues with their doors.
What a wonderful documentary! I never realized these lines, and it's history when I visited San Francisco.
If not for the social situation, San Fran is really one of my big heart places in the US.
On the N line, the abandoned station was named Eureka St, not Eureka Valley. I photographed its sidewalk entrance portals in 1970 but lost the photos. Fascinating video and history!
Wait, isn't the Eureka station right near Castro and the Twin Peaks tunnel (JKM), and not the N line?
My error, the Eureka St station was in the Twin Peaks tunnel (K,L,M lines).
Eureka station was just west of Castro on the K/L/M.
I actually like the hybrid, reduces costs significantly. In France they built metro lines under areas where it’s not possible to expand the road and have it go to a separated fast lane on the surface, where there is enough space. They don’t use any cables on the surface - inside the metro it’s attached to the lines and outside it has special charging pads, at the station, on the ground, to which it is attaching while stationed for fast charging. During tourist season or school months, they just add a few more tramway wagons at the end to deal with the influx of people - great for costs and for traffic.
This proves historic streetcar and interurban radial railways can be modernized and upgraded , a better more profitable option than scrapping and decommissioning
I saw the J-Church cut-out in the thumbnail, had to click. That's my ride downtown!
10:50 - me, in my apartment on Jersey just off Church, wondering if that's the video I hear, or is it outside?
Thanks, I’m not far away but there is so little that I know. I hope you have more to tell, really looking forward to your next story.
Wow, you only have one video? The production and content are top notch! Looking forward to more videos :)