F Market & Wharves
The F Market & Wharves line is one of several light rail lines in San Francisco, California. Unlike most other lines in the system, the F line runs as a heritage streetcar service, almost exclusively using historic equipment both from San Francisco's retired fleet as well as from cities around the world (although buses are added during peak commute hours). While the F line is operated by the San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni), its operation is supported by Market Street Railway, a nonprofit organization of streetcar enthusiasts which raises funds and helps to restore vintage streetcars.
Introduced as the F Market in 1983, in the first San Francisco Historic Trolley Festival, the service originally operated between the Castro District and the Transbay Terminal, continuing to do so after being launched as a full-time, year-round service in 1995.[2] In March 2000, it was extended at its eastern end to the Embarcadero and northwards along that street to Fisherman's Wharf, and a short section of the route between Market Street and the Transbay Terminal was discontinued.[3]
Despite its heritage status, the F Market & Wharves line is an integral part of Muni's intermodal urban transport network, operating at frequent intervals for 20 hours a day, seven days a week. It carries local commuters and tourists alike, linking residential, business and leisure oriented areas of the city. Unlike the San Francisco cable car system, the cheaper standard Muni fare system applies.
History
Previous F-Line
Cable car operations along Market Street began in 1888. Service was electrified in 1906.[4]
In 1915, the
The F-line designation was therefore available for use by the current line, although that service is over a completely different route from the F-line of 1915 to 1951.
Previous lines on Market Street
Market Street is a major transit artery for the city of San Francisco, and has carried in turn horse-drawn streetcars, cable cars and electric streetcars. In the 1960s construction began on the Market Street subway, which would carry BART's trains on its lower level. All streetcar lines currently operating in the subway previously ran on the surface of Market Street, and were eventually diverted into the upper level of the tunnel. This diversion, together with the provision of new light rail cars, resulted in today's Muni Metro system.
The diversion of the Market Street streetcar lines into tunnel and the replacement of the existing streetcars with new light rail cars was completed by November 1982. However, the street trackage on Market Street was retained, and many of the old streetcars were still in storage.
Historic trolley festivals
In 1982, San Francisco's cable car lines were shut down for almost two years to allow for a major rebuild. Temporary weekend historic streetcar service started on July 3, 1982 as part of 4th of July celebrations and ran until September of that year.[4] To provide a more regular alternative tourist attraction during this period, the San Francisco Historic Trolley Festivals began in 1983.[5][4] These summertime operations of vintage streetcars on Market Street were a joint project of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and Muni.[5]
The trolley festival route went from the
F-Market Line
The Trolley Festival proved so successful it was repeated every year until 1987. In that year, preparation began for the introduction of a permanent F line. After that year's festival finished, Muni replaced the old Market Street tracks with new ones, restoring tracks to upper Market Street and recreating a line to Castro. Different types of vintage streetcars were evaluated to provide the backbone of the F-line fleet, resulting in the decision to use the PCC car, due in part to its historic San Francisco transit use. Fourteen such cars were acquired second-hand from Philadelphia to add to three of Muni's own retired double-ended PCCs.[citation needed]
On September 1, 1995, the F line opened
Extension on the Embarcadero
The
With the freeway demolished, the waterfront started to be redeveloped for leisure and tourist activities, similar to
A month after the opening of the extension, Muni dedicated a car to Herb Caen, the noted columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle perhaps most famous for coining the phrase Baghdad by the Bay to describe The City. The car, Streetcar No. 130, which was originally delivered in 1914, contains wood paneling and is decorated with many quotes from Caen.[14][15]
Service was suspended in March 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. It resumed on May 15, 2021, with limited hours; full hours resumed on June 26.[16][17] Additional weekend afternoon short turn service between Fisherman's Wharf and the Ferry Building, operated by buses rather than streetcars, was added effective June 10, 2023.[18]
Better Market Street
The Better Market Street project, a streetscape project launched in the late 2000s to improve Market Street, has a transit component that aims to improve the operations of the F Line. The project would consolidate and eliminate some stops on Market Street and would also construct a new turn-around loop for the F Line at McAllister and 7th Streets.[19] The loop would allow increased service between Fisherman's Wharf and the Civic Center area, which is the section of the line with the highest ridership. Average headways under the service improvement would be 5 minutes instead of the current 7.5-minute scheduled headways.[20]
In 2022, the city was forced to return a $15-million federal grant when it was revealed that they did not expect any construction of the loop to begin before the federally-mandated deadline of September 2025. Construction was shelved indefinitely.[21]
Proposed extension
Muni completed a technical feasibility study to extend the F-Line from the vicinity of the existing Jones Street terminal with the assistance of the National Park Service in December 2004. The extended line would extend westward alongside the San Francisco Maritime Museum and Aquatic Park and then through the historic (1914) but disused single-track Fort Mason Tunnel, formerly owned by the State Belt Railroad.
An Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the extension, again led by the National Park Service, commenced in May 2006,[22] resulting in:
- a draft conceptual engineering report, issued in January 2009[23]
- a proposed transit operations plan, issued in July 2009[24]
- a draft EIS, issued in March 2011[25]
- the Final EIS, issued in February 2012[26]
The final document classified areas west of the Fort Mason Tunnel as having "inadequate regional transit access...limited transportation options for transit-dependent residents...[and] infrastructure constraints impacting effectiveness and operations of Fort Mason Center." The Final EIS named a double-tracked extension along Beach Street, a jog north to Aquatic Park, then across Van Ness Avenue to single-tracked service through a retrofitted Fort Mason Tunnel and to a terminus in the Fort Mason Center parking lot as the "preferred alternative".[26]
Car fleet
Muni owns a large selection of equipment for use on the F line, although not all of them are in service at the same time. The car fleet includes four sub-fleets: PCC streetcars, Peter Witt streetcars, pre-PCC veteran streetcars from San Francisco, and a diverse collection of 10 streetcars and trams from various overseas operators.[27]
The line is principally operated by a mixture of the PCC and Peter Witt cars, although other more unusual or historic cars are often in service (including the 913 and 952, iconic streetcars named Desire) since they are from New Orleans. The modern LRVs used by Muni Metro cannot be used on F Market & Wharves tracks because the overhead line is not compatible with pantograph operation (though the older streetcars can operate on most surface sections of the Muni Metro system).
PCC fleet
A fleet of
MUNI has another 30 unrestored PCC cars in long-term storage.
Many of the restored cars are painted in the color schemes of prominent past and present PCC streetcar operators, including Muni itself and other transit systems.[28]
Peter Witt fleet
Muni operates a fleet of Peter Witt streetcars on the line, acquired from Milan, Italy. There are 11 of these cars, all built in 1928 to an Italian derivative of a common streetcar design that operated in many US cities, although never previously in San Francisco.[30]
Most of San Francisco's Peter Witt cars are currently painted in the overall orange color scheme that they carried in Milan, although one has been repainted into its original livery of yellow and white with black trim, while another is in the two-tone green livery that the cars carried from the 1930s to the 1970s.[30]
San Francisco vintage fleet
The F-Line fleet also includes a fleet of pre-PCC vintage cars built between 1895 and 1924 for use in San Francisco. Three passenger cars were built for Muni itself, and a further two for the independent
The cars carry a variety of former San Francisco streetcar color schemes.[31]
Worldwide fleet
The Muni's international fleet on the F-Line includes a diverse collection of 10 cars from various operators worldwide:[31]
- boat cars)
- The former Hamburg tram system, in Hamburg, Germany
- Hankai Tramway, in Osaka, Japan
- Kobe Municipal Transportation Bureau & Hiroshima Electric Railway, in Kobe & Hiroshima, Japan
- Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways Board, in Melbourne, Australia
- Moscow tram system, in Moscow, Russia (5 ft or 1,524 mm system)
- Porto tram system, in Porto, Portugal
- .
All the cars carry the color schemes of their original operators, except for the Brussels car, which currently carries a color scheme paying tribute to San Francisco's twin city of Zürich in Switzerland (the streetcars actually in use in Zürich use meter-gauge and therefore cannot be moved to San Francisco). The Moscow trams had to be equipped with 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) trucks.[citation needed]
Stop listing
Stop | Neighborhood | Connections and Notes | |
---|---|---|---|
Inbound | Outbound | ||
Jones and Beach | Fisherman's Wharf | Embarcadero, Powell-Hyde | |
Jefferson and Taylor | Beach and Mason |
| |
Jefferson and Powell | |||
The Embarcadero and Stockton | Beach and Stockton |
| |
Inbound splits from The Embarcadero towards Jefferson Street; outbound joins The Embarcadero from Beach Street | |||
The Embarcadero and Bay | |||
The Embarcadero and Sansome | Embarcadero | ||
The Embarcadero and Greenwich |
| ||
The Embarcadero and Green |
| ||
The Embarcadero and Broadway | Embarcadero | ||
The Embarcadero and Washington | |||
Ferry Building | Financial District | ||
Don Chee Way and Steuart | Financial District | ||
Market and Main | Market and Drumm | ||
Market and 1st Street | Market and Battery | AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, Muni, SamTrans | |
Market and 2nd Street | Market and New Montgomery |
| |
Market and 3rd Street | Market and Kearny | AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, Muni, SamTrans | |
Market and 4th Street | Market and Stockton |
| |
Market and 5th Street | |||
Market and 6th Street | Market and Taylor | Civic Center, Tenderloin |
AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, Muni, SamTrans |
Market and 7th Street | Market and 7th Street |
| |
Market and 8th Street | Market and Hyde | ||
Market and 9th Street | Market and Larkin | Muni: 6, 7, 9, 9R, 19, 21, 83X, AC Transit, SamTrams | |
Market and Van Ness | |||
Market and Gough | Hayes Valley | ||
Market and Guerrero | Market and Laguna | ||
Market and Dolores | Market and Buchanan | Duboce Triangle | |
Market and Church | |||
Market and Sanchez | The Castro
|
Muni: 37 | |
Market and Noe | |||
17th Street and Castro |
See also
References
- ^ "Short Range Transit Plan: Fiscal Year 2019 - Fiscal Year 2030" (PDF). San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. December 2019. p. 47.
- The San Francisco Chronicle. p. A11. Archivedfrom the original on August 17, 2019. Retrieved August 17, 2019.
- ^ The San Francisco Chronicle. p. A20. Archivedfrom the original on February 25, 2019. Retrieved August 17, 2019.
- ^ a b c d Callwell, Robert (September 1999). "Transit in San Francisco: A Selected Chronology, 1850–1995" (PDF). San Francisco Municipal Railway.
- ^ ISBN 0-916374-60-2.
- ISSN 8750-8486. Archived from the originalon June 17, 2019.
- ^ Ehrlich, Peter. "PCCs by the Bay". Passenger Train Journal, June 1996 issue, pp. 24–31. Pentrex.
- ^ "Historic Streetcars". San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. Retrieved February 8, 2011.
- ISSN 8750-8486. Archived from the originalon June 8, 2019.
- ^ "A brief history of the F-line". Market Street Railway. Archived from the original on October 3, 2006. Retrieved March 20, 2006.
- ^ ISSN 1460-8324.
- ISSN 1460-8324.
- The San Francisco Chronicle. August 15, 2000. p. A26.
- ^ King, John (September 22, 2005). "Take a trip with Herb Caen, who lives on in an F-Market streetcar". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ Rose, Paul (October 29, 2014). "SFMTA Announces Details of Muni Heritage Weekend" (PDF) (Press release). San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ Maguire, Mariana (May 3, 2021). "Welcome Back to the F Market & Wharves Historic Streetcars" (Press release). San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.
- ^ Aguilar, Enrique (June 24, 2021). "Extended Service Hours for the F Market & Wharves" (Press release). San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.
- ^ "Service Changes: June 10, 2023". San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority. June 10, 2023.
- ^ Rudick, Roger (February 13, 2018). "Better Market Street Update". Streetsblog San Francisco. Retrieved December 11, 2018.
- ^ Better Market Street Project EIR Volume I (PDF) (Report). San Francisco Planning Department. February 28, 2019. Retrieved March 15, 2019.
- ^ Cano, Ricardo (October 25, 2022). "S.F. must return $15 million in grants to revitalize Market Street after failing to hit deadline". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved November 3, 2022.
- ^ "Extension of F-Line Streetcar Service to Fort Mason Center". National Park Service. March 15, 2013. Archived from the original on March 7, 2015. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ URS Corporation (January 22, 2009). DRAFT Conceptual Engineering Report (PDF) (Report). National Park Service – Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ URS Corporation (July 2009). FINAL Task 10 Working Paper: Transit Operations Plan (PDF) (Report). National Park Service – Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 30, 2016. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ Picavet, Alexandra; Cullivan, Lynn (March 18, 2011). "Draft Environmental Impact Statement for Extension of F-Line Streetcar Service to Fort Mason Center Now Open for Comment" (Press release). San Francisco, California: National Park Service. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ a b Final Environmental Impact Statement for Extension of F-Line Streetcar Service to Fort Mason Center (PDF) (Report). Golden Gate National Recreation Area: San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. February 2012. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 30, 2016. Retrieved June 30, 2016.
- ^ "The historic streetcars of the F-line fleet". Market Street Railway. 2007. Retrieved May 14, 2007.
- ^ a b c "The PCC: A streetcar named success". Market Street Railway. 2007. Retrieved October 14, 2007.
- ^ "F-line fleet operational status". Market Street Railway. 2007. Retrieved October 14, 2007.
- ^ a b "The Milan 'Peter Witt' trams". Market Street Railway. 2007. Retrieved October 14, 2007.
- ^ a b c "Muni's incomparable antique streetcars". Market Street Railway. 2007. Retrieved October 14, 2007.