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Road crews uncover old streetcar tracks during sewer work.
As we move around in our modern world, we tend to forget how things used to be. But every now and then, during the most meaningless of moments, we are reminded.
That’s what happened on Monday, when cub reporter David H. came upon a road crew on California between 15th and 16th Avenue. The street had to be opened up for some sewer work and as crews dug in, they stumbled upon a piece of San Francisco’s transit history – old streetcar tracks.
“The wooden ties were a bit rotted but the rails and spikes were as good as new,” David said. He even snagged a couple of the spikes for his collection.
After seeing pics of this accidental archaeological dig, I contacted Richmond District historian John Freeman to get more background on the streetcars that used to run along California Street.
California Street had the first rail line that went completely through the Richmond, as the steam train of the Ferries and Cliff House Railway. It opened September 30, 1888 to take passengers from the end of three cable car lines that terminated at Central Avenue (now Presidio Avenue) at the Laurel Hill Cemetery, to Sutro Baths and the grand chateau Cliff House which opened in 1896.
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The C streetcar at 2nd Avenue & Clement, 1948. Courtesy outsidelands.org
John says the rails uncovered on California Street could date as far back at 1905. The #1 Sutter and California streetcar may have traveled on them. According to outsidelands.org, the C Geary-California streetcar line began running in 1915 out to Park Presidio / 13th Avenue as the Municipal Railway’s seventh route. The line was then extended to 33rd Avenue and California in 1915.
But with progress comes changes, and on July 3, 1949, all rail service on the California Street trolley tracks ended, to be replaced by buses. The Richmond District did have the B-Geary streetcar line up until December 1956, when it was replaced by the #38 bus line.
John says that simply covering over the streetcar rails was a common practice. Just a few years ago, he saw a similar scene on Balboa when they were doing roadwork.
“You would think the rails had salvage value, but in a post-WWII world, scrap steel was not very valuable and it was cheaper to cover the rails than to remove them for their scrap value,” John told me.
Special thanks to David H. for snapping pics and to John Freeman for providing the background on what was uncovered.
Sarah B.
Clik here to view.
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