On the Road and In Your Backyard

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

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For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

Today, pictures from valued commenter ?BillinGlendaleCA.

Angels Flight
(The Shortest Railroad in the World)

In the late 19th century and early 20th century Bunker Hill was the fashionable residential neighborhood towering to the west of the downtown Los Angeles as it grew south from the Spanish plaza. As with other neighborhoods of Los Angeles at the time there were steps to get people up to their mansions. In 1901 Colonel J.W. Eddy figured he could make some coin extracting some coin from these wealthy folk by building a narrow gauge funicular railway up Bunker Hill at the corner of 3rd and Hill streets It was next to the newly opened 3rd Street Tunnel(it runs under Bunker Hill from Hill Street to Figueroa Street), crossing over Clay Street before reaching Olive Street at the top of it’s run. It seems that short rail lines were all the rage at the time since 1905 saw the opening of the little remembered Court Flight between Broadway and Hill streets in the current Civic Center(across from the red brick courthouse). Angels Flight has two rail cars, Sinai and Olivet, that operate in opposing directions and originally moved on a single cable. Angels Flight operated at this location for 68 years seeing the decline of the neighborhood as the wealthy moved further west to neighborhood such as Angelino Heights and mid-Wilshire. The stately mansions turned into boarding houses and hotels. In the postwar era, the city decided that they needed to redevelop Bunker Hill and Angels Flight was closed in May of 1969. I was fortunate to ride Angels Flight in it’s original location on a Cub Scout trip to downtown in early 1969. The cars, the ticket plaza at the top and the entrance arch at the bottom were put into storage for the “brief period”(2 years they said at the time) while they relocated the tracks a half of a block to the south. This “brief period” turned out to be 27 years. Angels Flight re-opened in 1996 and instead of transporting the wealthy to their stately mansions it now transported office workers from their offices in the skyscrapers that replaced the stately mansions. In 2001 there was a serious accident on the railroad that killed an elderly German tourist and led to Angeles Flight being closed once again. It reopened in 2008 to only have another accident in 2013(this time without any deaths or major injuries) close it down again. It recently reopened on August 31, 2017 so I decided to take a spin on it.

Upper plaza and ticket window.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

This is were you buy your ticket for the trip, if you riding up the hill you pay here after you ride up. It’s the same building that served this purpose from 1901 to 1969 though it did change a bit over the years. The cars and the stations received a fresh coat of paint as part of the latest renovation.

Inside one of the cars.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

This is inside one of the cars(I’m not sure if it’s Sinai or Olivet) looking through the car and down the tracks from the top.

About half way down.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

This is about half way down the hill and you can see that the tracks move out to the side to let the ascending car move past.

About 3/4er’s the way down.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

Here, the other car has passed and both cars are making the transition from the duel track to the single track.

At the Hill street station.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

This picture really gives a good idea how long the railroad is, with the car I’m in at the bottom and the other car at the top.

Station at Hill Street.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

This is the Hill Street station and is right across from the Grand Central Market where you can get some nice eats.

Car waiting to go up.

Taken on 2017-09-07

Los Angeles, CA

Here is a car at the Hill Street Station waiting to go up. The concrete buildings in the background is where Angels Flight originally was.

 

Thank you so much ?BillinGlendaleCA, do send us more when you can.

 

Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.

 

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