At Market Street Railway, we focus on historic rail vehicles, but there are plenty of other historic vehicles in San Francisco as well, and we celebrate all of them. One group of interest are the DUKW vehicles run by Bay Quackers. Universally referred to as Ducks instead of their military acronym, these are the World War II-era amphibious vehicles you see carrying tourists along The Embarcadero from Fisherman’s Wharf to Mission Bay, where they plunge into the water for a cruise.
The Chronicle’s story the other day about a study to restrict automobiles on Market Street downtown contains an important nugget of information that got buried in the story.
MSR Members are welcomed to our annual meeting on Tuesday, March 10. We’ll meet as usual at the IBEW Local 6 Hall, 55 Fillmore Street, one block north of Duboce (N-line Duboce and Church stop, F-line Church Street stop, 22-line bus).
Did you see it during the Super Bowl? No, not the great plays on the field, the commercial for the upcoming animated film “Monsters Vs. Aliens”? We know the premise — scientists unleash monsters to battle an alien invasion — but what’s fascinating is a, uh, plot vehicle. Specifically, Milan tram No. 1811. Its another example of the growing visibility of the Milan trams as a San Francisco institution. We’ll have a story on that in the next issue of our member newsletter, Inside Track, which will go out to Market Street Railway members in early April. For now, enjoy the movie trailer, and feel free to speculate about what part No. 1811 might play in saving the world.
In What Have We Learned? we discussed what we have learned since the first Trolley Festival 25 years ago about the pluses and minuses of various vintage streetcar types in F-line service. Now, we discuss what we’ve learned about operations over that period.
Judy Garland’s great singing made the 1944 movie “Meet Me in St. Louis,” about the 1904 World’s Fair. The film debuted two original songs with enduring popularity. “The Trolley Song,” as in “Clang, clang, clang went the trolley…” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” now a part of the holiday music canon. The film also produced … Liza Minnelli, because Garland met her future husband, Vincente Minnelli, on the set (he was the director).
(Hmmm … half a column already — not bad.)
Even though 2009 has barely started it’s already time to start planning for next year’s annual calendar. Last year we extended the invitation to submit photos for the calendar to our Flickr group as a contest. We had a lot of great photos to choose from and photos from both Tammy Abraham and Simon Batistoni are featured in this year’s calendar.
Muni tries to pull its Milan “Peter Witt” trams in from F-line service by 9:00pm because of community complaints about their noise. No such restrictions in their hometown. Check out this incredible parade of various Milan trams, from twins of Muni’s Milanos to the latest seven-truck supertram.
