<\/p>\n
The cable car terminal at California and Market Streets saw a recent upgrade.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rick Laubscher\/Market Street Railway<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a new look these days at California and Market streets in San Francisco, the downtown terminal of the world\u2019s oldest operating cable car line.<\/p>\n
Though the California Street line has been running through Chinatown and up and down Nob Hill for 147 years, it carries fewer than half the passengers of the two\u00a0Powell Street lines.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The\u00a0Cal cable, as its admirers call it, is a dignified line as cable cars go. It lacks the scenic sights of the Powell-Mason and Powell-Hyde cars. It\u2019s the oldest of the three remaining cable lines, but there are no big curves on California Street, no dramatic steep grades, no turntables where the cars are swung around. No big crowds, either.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
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It is \u201cThe Road Not Taken\u201d in the words of Robert Frost, the San Francisco-born poet who\u2019s honored with a monument at the Market Street end of the California cable line.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
But the Frost monument, set in a small plaza near the cable car tracks, was once the only distinguishing mark of the area. The place lacked\u00a0pizzazz.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, two nonprofit organizations and the city\u2019s Municipal Railway decided to bring new life to the old corner, spending about $200,000 on upgrades.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is really a\u00a0dramatic space,\u201d said Claude\u00a0Imbault, deputy director of the Downtown SF Partnership, a community benefit district that covers the Financial District.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A tourist photographs the California cable car.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rick Laubscher\/Market Street Railway<\/p>\n
The corner where California runs into Market Street has everything: the Embacadero BART and Muni Metro subway station, historic streetcars passing by, the striking Hyatt Regency Hotel, the Ferry Building, the Financial District and the end of a cable car line.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s the heart of San Francisco, the gateway to downtown,\u201d\u00a0Imbault said.<\/p>\n
The nonprofit Market Street Railway, which promotes vintage transportation in conjunction with\u00a0Muni, was enthusiastic.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe wanted to create a sense of place and an upgrade at the terminal,\u201d said Rick\u00a0Laubscher, the organization\u2019s president.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Muni brass welcomed the idea. By summer the plaza got new cable car ticket machines, new benches, and a selection of information placards with cable car history and lore, along with neighborhood guide information.<\/p>\n
Most striking of all, the Downtown SF Partnership set up a 6-foot high red heart, flanked by the letters \u201cSF.\u201d The heart is designed to frame the cable cars, perfect for a tourist photo.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s not hard to get the picture: It\u2019s Tony Bennett and cable cars climbing halfway to the stars.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNothing wrong with a little bit of drama,\u201d\u00a0Imbault said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Downtown SF also sponsors street ambassadors, who are ready to help visitors and offer directions. Chris Thompson was staffing a podium the other afternoon, helping the proverbial little old ladies, assisting suburbanites lost in the city and keeping an eye out for panhandlers. His specialty this fall: helping with family photos at the heart sculpture.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt makes a great Christmas card,\u201d he said. \u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The heart sculpture at the California Street cable car terminal at Market and California Streets in San Francisco is a popular attraction for photos.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rick Laubscher\/Market Street Railway<\/p>\n
Laubscher and the others are thinking about more improvements on Market Street and a new look at the dreary Van Ness Avenue end of the line at some point in the future.<\/p>\n
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I decided to take a ride. As it turned out, the next car heading west was car No. 53, originally built for the old California Street Cable Railroad Co. in 1907 and dedicated to Tony Bennett last year.<\/p>\n
We rumbled up California Street, past the famous\u00a0Tadich Grill, the West\u2019s oldest restaurant, through the Financial District, stopping now and then to pick up passengers.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Most San Franciscans would notice there are fewer people on California Street these days; changing work habits have emptied out the big old office buildings. But the ride was classic, a steady pace, 9 mph, up the middle of the street. Then up and over Nob Hill, past grand hotels and famous landmarks including Grace Cathedral.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The California Street crews are often veterans, the run is a classic, there are no crowds, and many of the passengers are regulars. The gripman that afternoon was Leonard Oats, who has 25 years of service and won the annual bell ringing contest more than once. The conductor was Antonio Margnardt, who has worked for Muni for 30 years. It\u2019s in his blood\u00a0\u2014 his father was a Muni man for 60 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As a kid, Antonio used to hang around the car barn or take rides. On slow days when nobody was looking, an operator would give him a chance.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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\u201cHey, kid,\u201d the man would say, \u201cWant to drive?\u201d He did, and he was hooked.<\/p>\n
A lifetime later, he\u2019s still at it. It\u2019s easy to see why. The sound and slap of the cables, the machinery, the bells, the fresh air, a chance to ride outside, the small thrill a kid gets when the conductor says, \u201cHold on,\u201d and the car lurches down a hill, down and down, the wheels squealing, the acrid smell of the brakes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the end of the run, the\u00a0gripman pushes the big lever forward to drop the cable, stopping the car.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAll out,\u201d he says. \u201cMarket Street.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Julien Bassan was along for a ride the other afternoon. He lives in Los Angeles now after some years in San Francisco.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI always take a cable car and not a cab when I\u2019m back here on business,\u201d he said. I asked him why.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s quintessentially San Francisco,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The cable car terminal at California and Market Streets saw a recent upgrade.\u00a0 Rick Laubscher\/Market Street Railway There\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33775,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[184,7,9,8,101,3766],"class_list":{"0":"post-33774","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-bay-area","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-california-headlines","11":"tag-california-news","12":"tag-san-francisco","13":"tag-transit"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33774\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}