Los Angeles Streetcars - The Final Years

Los Angeles commuters of the 1950s and earlier fondly referred to their unique narrow-gauge streetcars as "yellow cars." By the mid-fifties, there were six of these yellow car lines being operated by the Los Angeles Transit Lines.

Come along for a trip back in time, to a city that has now faded from all buy memory and film. We'll take you on a complete, end-to-end tour of the W and S lines, which were the last car lines using H Series standard-type streetcars. You'll also catch a glimpse of the two trolley coach lines that graced the city in 1956.

In 1958, the Metropolitan Transit Authority took over from the Los Angeles Transit Lines and converted the whole system to streamlined PCC-type cars. Most of these cars were painted two-tone green. You'll see the entire routes of the system's five remaining lines, which were identified as R, S, V, P and J. This historic presentation then takes you to the Georgia Street Car House on the last day of the system's operation, and to the Vernon Yard as the retired cars are placed in storage.

Railfans, historians, and Angelenos of all ages will be thrilled with the fascinating detail in this remarkable video about the final years of Los Angeles's memorable yellow car lines.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• los
• angeles
• street
• cars
• pentrex
• redcars
• trolley
• california

[timosha21]

LOS ANGELES COULD have been one of the most cleanest cities. It killed its trams and trolleybuses. Because of greed from GM and Ford. They pushed legislation to get rid of the system and replace them with buses. Also to encourage cars... Now LA is stuck in traffic jams daily and it has heavy pollution.

[emforty2]

enjoy your $50 gas fill ups, traffic , smog, $2k insurance premiums, $8 a day parking fees and enjoy your weekends at GMs dealearship while your car is being serviced

in Europe and most of Asia you can go not just between cities but between COUNTRIES by rail !

[shasba]

You have to remember that LA used to burn its trash so combine that with the cars it was way more polluted then even with the light rail than now. That being said,I miss the streetcars

[LurlineUnderway]

You can't blame everything on Nat'l City lines. People had money, they were moving to the suburbs which were off of freeways not streetcar lines. It was epic bad planning, but it was no worse than our foreign policy, and produced the mess we endure today.

Today LA is rapidly building streetcar lines, arguably faster than some are catching on. But the Blue Line is America's single heaviest used rail transit line.

[gygyman64]

@loonercrazy Believe what you want, I won't argue, but it seems very suspicious that this happened all across the US and some parts of the world at the same time.

[loonercrazy]

@gygyman64 Actually I saw a great 2 hour documentary on the Pacific Electric Railway system of LA and it clearly pointed out it was the MTA in its initial formation as an agency that bought up the various lines one by one and eventually converted them over to the bus lines as how we have them now. That is my the MTA runs various busses that look amazingly similar in style as a throwback to the old railcars and each line is named after the original colors. It wasn't a car company

[metalux1971]

where i come from (The Hague ,Holland) we had almost simular PCC streetcars

they where also American built and i grew up with them .

even they where still in use until 1993

search for pictures  on google : PCC tram HTM

[gygyman64]

@loonercrazy Actually he is right, where GM did not have private companies owning the systems, it simply bought the people, by giving them cadillacs so they would eventually convert to buses. You have to watch "taken for a ride" or read about the "great american streetcar scandal". If it wasn't for GM, than how do you explain that the US has less streecars than Europe or Japan?!

[loonercrazy]

@timosha21 You don't even know what you are talking about. The MTA, which was an upstart operator of the mass transit bus system back then kept buying up the various streetcar and train routes and eventually shut them down and replaced them with busses. GM and Ford had nothing to do with the demise of the LA streetcars.

[LiftYaGame]

Melbourne Australia still has a fantastic working and massive tram network with some of the old ones still on tourist routes

[JollyRodders]

@JollyRodders O.K added to my last post put >> It's A Big Job (Part 1) << into the search box. You'll see parts 2 to 3 on the right hand side.

[JollyRodders]

There used to be a film on YouTube in four parts called "It's a big job" about training to be a yellow car operator. It may still be on here somwhere, but I'm buggered if I can find it.