Like many transit systems, Muni has had its idiosyncrasies over its first century of serving San Franciscans. On a recent trip to look at historic buses, we were reminded of one that made us chuckle all over again.
After World War II, Muni got its first vehicles with treadles in the rear stepwells. When you stepped down, the doors opened automatically at stops. Not a world-shaking event to us today, but Muni management in that day must have thought it would befuddle riders — or they were singularly concerned about safety — so they posted these remarkably detailed instructions over the rear doors of all their PCC streetcars, trolley coaches, and motor coaches. Even after people got the hang of it, the instructions stayed up, well into the 1970s, if we remember correctly.
If you stopped to read something that convoluted by the back doors of a Muni vehicle today, you’d be run over…mostly by people climbing on without paying!
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