"Inside Track", the quarterly publication of the Market Street Railway, recently provided some information about some of the F-line streetcars in their Winter 2008 issue:

1. Ex- Newark/Minneapolis PCCs:

Muni has sidelined the eleven cars (1070 to 1080) because of wiring problems, but they are now fully engaged in fixes. Just four of the cars had entered service last summer when rear doors on a couple of the cars started opening when they shouldn't have. While it only happened a few times, it was obviously unacceptable. Although one of the cars had been leased to Muni for a couple of years, there was no effort made by the engineering to test the car extensively on the street to determine the actual condition of the wiring, which was original to the cars , built right after World War II. Muni has isolated a particular section of wiring they think may be responsible for the problem and has replaced it on two cars, 1078 (San Diego) and 1079 (Detroit), and were testing them on the street during February. Muni is scoping a contract to have all wiring on the cars replaced. The cars will probably be required in stages.

2. Muni 162 and New Orleans 952:

Municipal Railway 162 was purchased from the Orange Empire Railway Museum in 2003. It was built in 1914 by the Jewett Car Company in Ohio and was one of 125 Class "B" cars (series 44-168) . The car is being restored to its final appearance in Muni "Wings" green and cream. Restoration began in 2004. The trucks and motors were upgraded; a new low voltage power supply was added to the car; rotten window sash was replaced, platforms straightened and strengthened. The car is now running on its own power and is shown below just out of the paint shop late last month.

This car is scheduled for a special charter run on April 19, 2008.

New Orleans 952 had seen a lot of service since arriving in San Francisco in 1998. It has been one of the victims of the lack of a closed shelter for the vintage cars in which they were originally designed to be stored. The car required complete repainting, replacement of door panels and some window sash. It was returned to service early in February and is shown below leaving Geneva for a test run. The really good news is that later this year, work may start on enclosing six of the tracks at Geneva to protect these treasures.

Notice the new red taillight above the center destination sign. Learning from previous actual and potential mishaps, these lights will be added to all of the non-PCC heritage cars as they come in for overhaul and will help prevent night and low visibility rear end collisions. Shown below is a close up of one of the lights recently installed on ex-Milan Peter Witt 1893. While Muni continues to do the best it can to protect and preserve its streetcars, on the East Coast, SEPTA (Philadelphia) continues to vandalize the meager remains of the great trolley system that they inherited from the once great Philadelphia Transportation Company. So the U.S. streetcar capital will remain in San Francisco for years to come!

3. Melbourne 496:

Melbourne 496 has had some body panels replaced and a section of the roof recovered with new canvas. Car 496 was originally built for the Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways in 1929 and came to San Francisco in 1983.

[See Muni, Column 2]

For more information about that really nice model train show in Bakersfield, CA click here! Trolleyville was there! See our April 2008 issue!

Imagineering
Another way to enjoy in the hobby?
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In the past few years, we have seen more than a few imaginary models such as New Orleans PCC cars and Philadelphia 1930 Peter Witt cars. Of course some modelers recoil at the sight of models like Great Northern GG-1s, Budweiser PCC cars and New York Central Hudsons dolled up in Chessie colors.

But there is a really fun side to this. We recently received some information from a southern Arizona modeler who called it "Imagineering", and has cut and spliced several models of both U.S. and foreign prototypes to make some interesting models. He has a 9' by 9' by 9' "U" shaped layout with many of these models as shown below. He keeps up to date with new products and has even acquired one of the new undecorated Bachmann Peter Witt Cars.

He started his effort about five years ago and has accumulated more than 100 trolleys/trams/interurbans from around the world. About 25% of them are American PCC cars painted in a variety of paint schemes--few prototypically.

His layout has prototypical overhead wire, but he runs two-rail. In designing his layout, he decided to run everything with a pantograph. Positioning and adjusting trolley frogs was more than he wanted to deal with.

For more on this concept and photos of "Imagineered" cars , please click here.
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[Muni, from Column One]

4. Muni 1:

The last remaining Class A car is also getting some attention At one time there were 44 cars in this class, series 1-4, and they were last used on the F-Stockton line which is now the 30-Stockton trolley coach line.

The 1912-1913 built Class A cars were 6.5 inches narrower than the class B cars, which followed in 1914. It has also suffered from being outside in the San Francisco 'elements' and is shown being being prepared for a photo session. It needs major electrical work as it only operates from one end and some of the lights are inoperative.

5. Remaining "Torpedoes" and car 1040:

Muni purchased ten double-end PCC cars in 1948 (1006-1015) and operated most of them until the end of PCC service. 1006 was fixed for the trolley festival in the early 1980s and ran for a few years. Cars 1007, 1010 and 1015 were selected for the F-line fleet and were sent to Morrison-Knudson in 1993 for rebuilding along with the 14 ex-Philadelphia PCC cars.

They now represent Philadelphia Suburban Trans'n Co (1007), San Francisco Municipal Railway (1010) and Illinois Terminal (1015). Cars 1012 and 1013 were scrapped years ago and car 1014 is now in Australia at the Sydney Tramway Museum. The remaining three cars, 1008, 1009 and 1011 along with the 1006 are all seriously deteriorated but Muni wants to return them to service as they are all "crowd swallowers" and the F-line could sure use that type of car often. It is intended to return these cars to the same status as the other three double-ended PCCs now in service. At the same time, car 1040, shown below, reputed to be the last PCC car produced in the United States may be added to this group for renovation. Trolleyille was privileged to ride this car on the opening day of the F-line in September 1995.