BC Electric Railway: Then and Now

oh i'm uh frank horn i used to be a motorman on the bernabeu lake central park and worked even on the chilliwack line but i'd like to take you back down memory lane with me and watch this central park interurban coming out to the depot carroll street depot now that must be a burnaby lake pardon me with the central parks gonna follow him right out uh this film was made 40 years ago and uh the commentary is made in 40 years later so we're gonna have to do a little bit of comparison here that's the bernabeu lake just come over the viaduct uh on hastings street over the great northern railway tracks now he's cutting into the s curve on hastings street he's coming uh comes up to the switch at clark drive which was an electric switch the motorman had to take it pretty careful around there because the switch threw right in front of the car and if he was going too fast he would be headed up the wrong way he's turning on the clark drive now now he's heading across clark drive towards venables now he's coming up animals just about to commercial drive where little italy is now real sharp curve around that on to commercial drive now there's a two central park train with the burnaby lake behind them the bernabeu lake will stop here at 6th avenue and the conductor's got to get out and throw the switch to take the crossover and the burnaby lake line can start on his own right away after leaving commercial drive the conductor's got to go and register in the booths and call out the number of the meat that come in on the opposing train which he passed somewhere on the city street that's a little booth there with the conductor goes in to register you'll notice the central park train going down commercial drive a couple of the big chilliwack cars gonna show up here in a second there they go now we're on our way the bernabeu lakeland is on his own little right away now he's has to shoot back from sixth avenue to almost first avenue there's several little street crossings here now one more short block and we're at victoria victoria drive where the tracks cross and go up the steep grade that host you see they're still there with a brand new one built right on the right away now he's climbing the hill up towards lakeview there was no station in lakeview just a platform at the top of the hill that was a real steep grade and at least have a three-car train go up there in the rush hour every day and boy you could walk faster you could climb the hill now we can see the powerhouse in nanaimo road there in the distance this is actually now the alley of first avenue now we're very across in the angle now uh well he's coming up from vancouver they just reversed the scene here he's coming from vancouver now up to first avenue or up to nanaimo street at first avenue now he veers over and goes down the center of first avenue if you drive along there today you'll see there's grass all the way down the middle of the road and that's where the in urban line was right on the top of the grass that's first avenue the way it was 40 years ago about 1950 1950-51 that's slokan street station it wasn't it was just a platform there oh he's coming up to renfrew street there's the station ahead at renfrow this was all single track here and half the time the stations were on the wrong side the motorman couldn't he had to guess it where the door was but they got pretty slick at it after a while now he's heading going down the hill down towards windermere station quite a steep hill and he had to really keep a hold of it or you'd go whistling right by the station down the bottom there there's a flat spot where the train will sit without any air on it's perfectly level for you know about a couple hundred feet and then the next one is cassie r station you see the barricade on the road that's as far as their road went and in the springtime that caterpillars would get in there and man you would go sliding down there right around the curb and have to back all the way up because i'm greasy caterpillars and stink when they got uncooking on the wheel hot wheels we come around the bend here now and there's horn payne's substation a shot coming from vancouver to boundary road coming into horn payne station just beyond horn payne station is this where we have a meet a sighting from the he meets the fella come from safarin it's a one-hand sighting you have to pull in and back out this is the fella from sapperton he holds the main line the fella from vancouver heads into the siding the little tracks on the side are just spur tracks going into the horn pain substation where we took the transformers in i worked on a freight engine one day and we shoved a big heavy transformer in there was so heavy they had to build a spur through dominion bridge company to get the transformer to us now we're heading now towards gilmore station just about ready to go across the low heat highway that's the lawhead highway and the way going on in the second you should be able to see the spur they built through dominion bridge there it is that's the one they built just to bring that big heavy transformer in and a big depressed low bed flap now that's gilmore avenue it goes by gilmer and takes a big sweeping curve and parallels the great northern main line right down to queens station which is wellington now wellington avenue years and years ago it was called queen's avenue that's why queen station is still not was still known as queens in the far distance is the old par house the old substation of horn payne that signal is the smashboard signal allowing the burning lake line to cross over the great northern let's see automatic uh signals there so that the if there's a great northern coming you you have to wait for it to he clears there he just went across the great northern tracks across the flats now over still creek to murren station which was the foot of royal oak avenue there's the trestle over still creek mern station just ahead that's mirin for the now you'd be right along the side of the 401 freeway right here this is douglas road now at douglas road the road goes over the top of the freeway and the rush are we used to have two cars from here to vancouver they would cut one car off here at douglas and the brake one would stay with it this conductor and motorman would take the single car to their meet at hill and the fellow they met at hill would couple on to the single car we left at douglas road and they'd continue on to vancouver with the brakeman the brake one and the one car would stay always at douglas road to vancouver that's sprott station it's a one of the interchanges on the 401 freeway is brought heading now towards burnaby lake station which was the old spurling avenue actually spurling avenue is not cut through there anymore there's a big burnaby fire station there on spurling just off of douglas road here he comes around the bend heading towards spurling avenue and burnaby lake station oh he didn't stop at burnley lake he said why he's really wound up he's going to go right around there the race side that's a little trestle that little creek that he just went over is the trick that drains deer lake into burnaby lake there's rayside used to rent there was a horse farm here they used to used to rent horse riding horses and take the trail along the side of the tracks and ride almost around burnaby lake next station is force pretty lonely country out there but that's right the freeway is almost on top of the interim in there now just past divorce there's the meat down there you'll see him in the shadows that's to meet and uh he'll go back he'll go to vancouver and that's hill station we're carrying on to sapperton cumberland road is the next station it's just down the foot of cumberland road uh where uh up the hill is the george darby hospital you can't drive down there anymore but at one time you could drive right down to cumberland north station and he rhymes around through the bushes there around a couple of curves and we'll get to storm on curve here pretty quick it was quite a little sharp grade sharp turn and a fairly good little grade around there you had to get a hold of it coming around there you dump half your passengers there's storm on curve coming up just around the curve is uh stormont station and whistleboard on the white side on the post there with the s x on it that s is for station and x is for crossing you're supposed to blow the whistle when you see that now we're not far out of separate in the end of the line now we got to go over caribou road at caribou road station you can hardly find the right of way through here now it's all grown up there's caribou road station and that board with the right angle sign on it is the stop board that the it's facing the motor right now he has to stop because there's a bc electric bus line comes down there the lockdale bus comes down caribou road hill from westminster depot to boundary and hastings it went now he winds around around the side of the hill which is still pretty well pushed down there although on the high side of the hill they are clearing out and putting in new homes one little station here is called the golf club the kind of an interesting thing uh i didn't know for years why they called it golf club but in about 1910 the members of the vancouver golf club on austin road asked the bc electric to put the station in and they used to have a horse and wagon would come and pick the golfers up from golf club station and take them up with the horses and wagon up to the vancouver golf club on austin road later and later on a few years later they had an old mclaughlin buick that used to haul them on now we can see the car burns at stanford around the bend and that's the end of the line which at one time the line went right into right along columbia street in front of the penitentiary right down columbia down through town to the people at 8th street and columbia but when they put the buses in in 1937 this is the end of the line the conductor will go in that little booth and phone the dispatcher and get clearance to head back to vancouver and in a moment you'll see the motorman get out there out the back door and change the trolley pole there he is well that's the end of the burnaby lake but oh it looks like we're going to go ride on the central park line now let's see oh my goodness we're down here on columbia street right at 8th and columbia by the old tram depot that fancy lamp stand is right in front of the cpr depot that's the chilliwack baggage car coming over in the morning he's going to turn right into the depot into track 3. now there's the central park pulling out with a pair of saint louis pulling out of track one that's the big that's the westminster trust building in the background still looks as good today as it did then he's right out in the middle of columbia street and then he goes down past the front of the market over 10th street in a moment we'll get a shot of the car barns in new westminster there that's where they built a lot of them most of these cars were built in u.s mister right in those shops this is a big coolman car there was three of them bought you can tell by the round windows that that was a pair of st louie's there the square windows this is all stuarts and way now this is 14th street station right opposite alaska pine this skytrain guideway is right above this spot we had a stop at 12th street junction 3rd avenue 14th street 16th street 6th avenue mead in el sona and now the sky train leads westminster and goes straight to 22nd street which is about el sona with no stops climbing up the hill this is right alongside the stewartson way now we've crossed 6th avenue marine drive and we're heading to 20th street which was mead station there's a big pair of cool ones coming down heading towards new westminster there's el sauna now we're going around the bend to uh cannot hill station just beyond cannot hill now is uh used to be the old gravel pit but now it is where the car barns and repair shops for the sky train are that's cannot hill station right at 10th avenue the old spur you see is where they used to get the gravel guns out of the get the gravel out of the gravel pit and that big clear space is now where the sky train car barns are taking up the whole area here's the whistleboard for uh lee side station which was stride avenue there's [Music] mcgregor and we go around the bend and uh all that bush on the right is where weiser lock is now all industry there the next stop is printer which is straight down the hill from burnaby south high school now there's all the high school kids there oh run down the hill to catch this train but he's going to fool him he's not going to stop for them he's going to go right through there look at that meanie doing that the kids don't know it but he knows that there's another train following right behind him to take care of their school kids now he's coming around the band of fraser arms station this is at gilly avenue and this is where the buses met the interurban that looks like an old pair of thousands we had nine of those there was there 10 i guess it was 10 because they're all in pairs the next station is where the old original tram line used to go before they built the cutoff in 1912. if you see straight down through the camera that pole line and the track that is the old original westminster tramway it's still used for freight for a few uh for a couple of bucks here he's coming up to highland park station where the the old street car was on the old original tram line and the streetcar used to meet the train here before they put the buses on look at the big stump on the right hand side there huge big tree they must have fell now we're coming up to mcpherson station on the left-hand side it was a big cannery where they used to can fruit vegetables and they've just completely torn it all down now and it's all brand new nice condominiums heading towards royal oak station now we're crossing nelson avenue towards jubilee station now an interesting fact here that right from this station for the next four stations four or five stations is all metro town this is where the jubilee station is where imperial street crossed the tracks now he's leaving jubilee now the next station was dao road which is difficult to find now because of metrotown the spur on the right hand side is the freight spur that used to service the ford plant kelly douglas when they put that track in they had to cut the stations in half so they would see how skinny the station is they had to make room for the track that's down road station now you can see west burnaby is just up just a half a block away there was another stop we had to make now that is about right where metro town station is on the skytrain today then we come down to mckay and this will be patterson coming up a metro town goes practically from well it goes from mckay to patterson now we're going down through central park kingsway you can see the traffic on king's way ahead there have a good shot of one of the old pacific stage buses here in a moment it's a big green i think it's a brill but there was a beautiful bus in those days there he is look at that he's not afraid of that all into urban he knows that inner urban is going to stop at central park station now we're going down pretty good grade here if we can get through park avenue without stopping we can get this thing really rolling [Music] there's a big valley car coming up on the big chilliwack cars he goes right by park avenue station [Music] now this is what we used to call collingwood east which is now known as joyce station on the skytrain i always got lots of customers from collingwood east notice that this is calling wood west station but look at the woodwork on the top of the stations they were ornamental no other reason that anybody can figure out they all the stations at one time had there was like a spire on the top this is one of the old thousands we only used these in the rush hour they were not as quite as big and not as powerful as the general run there's the old powerhouse substation at earl's road that old building is still there today it looks like they're starting to dismantle it but it's still there this is earl's road station there's a portable substation out there just behind the station cover right here is where 29th street station is on the skytrain now next stop is beaconsfield that's slokan street but the skytrain goes underneath slokan street now this is one continuous grade right from lakeview station right up to collingwood west it's just a perfect grade all the way no up or down or any just perfect grade coming into nanaimo now nanaimo street goes underneath at this point and it still does on the skytrain nanaimo station [Music] [Music] that was gladstone trestle we're just going over there in this gladstone station just down the bottom of the hill is lakeview station right by trout lake it's coming around the corner now to victoria drive which was a very busy street in those days and there's a stop board for the interim the motorman has to stop it whistle off before he crosses victoria drive then it's a very short distance to cedar cottage station where he cuts onto the city street coming into cedar cottage now he's coming down commercial drive towards 12th avenue three-car train with the trailer in the center you'll notice there's no trolley poles on the center car it's no motors in it there's the old l6 the whole line car right out going over the great northern cut on commercial drive he's coming down venable street now gonna turn onto clark right by hammond furniture you notice how slow he's going that's a very pretty tight curve there he has to be pretty careful going around there now he's on clark drive heading for hastings street there's a pc pcc going around the s curve on hastings street and another pair that's it looks like a pair of thousands coming around yeah and one of the old steel street cars following him now there's a pair of saint louise coming down towards main street maine on hastings real busy transfer point man in hastings the only place on the whole railroad where they could go anywhere in any direction now he just crossed columbia starting in towards uh carroll street depot harry's crossed over to the opposite main heading into carroll street depot now that wasn't that a nice ride you went on well i'm going to give the mic over to brother vic sherman here because he's going to do a little commentary my voice is getting a little hoarse here's all yours vic well as uh thank you frank uh vic sherman speaking and i spent a long career in transit i worked for a little time on the inter-urbans and then became involved in the planning and scheduling of the system for many years so what we're going to look at now is the oak street car line which was a one-man car operation from downtown vancouver at victory square which is where we're showing the picture now going south on camby street and then ending in marple so as we look at this scene we see the car heading south on camby street coming down to robson and there's another oak street car coming towards us this car or this line rather was equipped with double-end one-man cars mostly the brill type cars which were quite comfortable in the latter days the cars had been rebuilt and equipped with leather seats and one man controls dead man operation and so on and provided a fairly comfortable but somewhat slow ride this scene is crossing the old camby bridge which of course has now been replaced by the new camby bridge or cannot bridge and the cars had to go very slow through the center span as the span swung and of course the trolley overhead had pans at each end of the span which required slow negotiating in order not to lose the trolley pole the scene shows us coming off camby bridge or cannot bridge and down towards 6th avenue and you might get a glimpse of the city hall just up in the left although i think we might have lost it and this is coming south on camby to to broadway here's the car approaching broadway making preparation to make a right turn to go westbound on broadway shared trackage with the fairview belt line and proceeding west on broadway passing willow street i believe heather street in the vicinity of the vancouver general hospital there's a fairview outer belt car just past this there and now we're coming up towards laurel street and then very shortly we'll make a left turn onto oak street there's the car approaching oak street turning into oak and there's a northbound car just ready to leave out to turn east onto broadway there's quite a sharp grade between broadway which is 9th avenue and then 10th avenue and we're just crossing 10th avenue now to the left was the old king edward school which has since been torn down and is now being filled in by buildings of the vancouver general hospital this is the s turn approaching 16th avenue and the line is double track at this point but will soon go into single track operation and here we are now on single track and we're coming into 22nd avenue where the first passing track was now this line was not equipped with any sophisticated signaling in fact it didn't have any signaling at all and the single track operation was controlled by what we call staffs just wooden sticks that had the section inscribed on them where the staff was giving the motorman the right way to travel in that section so as the motorman approaches the 22nd avenue siding here he has to wait for the northbound car to come and here's the northbound car coming you see the motormen or operators we call the one-man operators handing the staff across so now the southbound operator is in possession of the staff which gives him the right to travel in that single track section up to the next passing siding further up the hill this scene shows us crossing 25th avenue and you can see there's a siding into 25th avenue or king edward avenue we're now approaching shaughnessy hospital and there weren't many shelters on this line but you saw there was a shelter there at the hospital i guess for the benefit of people visiting the hospital perhaps rather unique for that line most of the stops were just in the open marked by cards or posters on the telephone poles we're now going up the hill towards 30 7th avenue and to the right now is the vandusen gardens and of course at that time the golf course shaughnessy golf course in place there to the left is the high school and here's a picture now of the car southbound coming up the hill towards 37th avenue [Music] and again we have a meet and you'll note the operators will exchange staffs and gain possession of the correct staff to allow them to proceed onto the next section this is a very simple system and yet it was fairly effective we're now coming south on oak street and approaching 41st avenue and of course to the left now is the oak ridge transit center and to the right is the louis bryer home and hospital but at that time shaughnessy golf course and it's hard to imagine that this intersection is so busy today when you look back 40 years ago it was quite quiet now there's one of the federal buses crossing and of course those buses were bought in great numbers and became the replacement vehicles for many of the streetcar lines as they were converted from rail to rubber we're now proceeding south on oak street between 41st and 49th avenue and to the left there was the a gun club which has since relocated to lulu island in richmond and this was all very sparsely populated area at the time going into another sighting and again there will be the exchange of the staff from the other car all the equipment we've noted thus far in this film are the jg brill cars these were built in philadelphia pennsylvania and were renovated however in the kitslana shops in vancouver now proceeding south on oak on the downgrade towards marple and this would be in the vicinity of about 54th avenue and the gentle curve as we come in towards 57th avenue i believe this is 57th avenue if i remember correctly the one-man cars of course were marked by the x on the front the two triangle shapes which indicated to the public that these cars would be entered by the front door the two-man cars didn't have such markings and of course passengers entered by the rear doors these particular cars had double stream front doors and then a single exit treadle door at the other end and again a further meet this is the last meet point before the termness at marple as i recall i think the cars ran on about a 10-minute basic headway and during rush hours there would be double heading because they couldn't improve the headways because of the spacing of the passing siding so at times in rush hours there'd be two cars running on the same schedule to provide increased capacity now the car has left oak street and is now on marine drive and in fact i believe at this point has come to the actual termness in marple and that's verified by the fact that the operator has cut out and is now putting up the other trolley pole and removing the other pole to change ends these cars were double enders with controls in each end and so the car is now leaving on its return trip to vancouver we're going to have a trip on the observation cars and we see the observation car sitting at the starting point at cambian hastings alongside the province building and the terminus which was shared with the oak street cars the observation cars were rather unique they were sort of a toast rack type design as you can see in the picture and were a real feature in vancouver for many many years they not only provided a sightseeing trip but there was also an entertainment feature to the cars there were two personality conductors who were well known in the city at the time one was teddy lyons who was actually a real comedian and kept the passengers entertained with his jokes and comedy and then the other conductor was dick gardner and dick was an amateur music or a magician and he could actually do sleight of hand tricks and really confound the passengers with these these various tricks now the cars made a big loop and ran south on granville street um and here we are crossing um the bridge uh this is the camby bridge actually and operated via granville 41st avenue dunbar and broadway incidentally there was a very old intercity type bus there it looked like a fitzschoon bus crossing camby bridge here we are here's the observation car heading south on camby followed by one of the new canadian car braille trolley coaches which of course were the vehicles that replaced the majority of the streetcar lines in vancouver also in that last picture was a pacific stage lines twin coach facial bus and this picture shows the camby trolley coach operating so this was taken after that first trolley coach conversion we're heading west on broadway now and here's a scene taken from the seats the seats were staggered so that people had a good view of a good forward facing view that's dick gardner uh acting as conductor on this particular trip dick was not only a magician he was a musician and a comedian and both he and teddy lyons were ideally suited to to this type of service now the car has gone all the way along west broadway and is now on dunbar coming up the dunbar hill around 14th avenue the dunbar diversion and is going to make a turn onto 16th avenue and then we'll go on dunbar southbound until it reaches 41st avenue on these trips the conductors had arranged with local people to have their children come out and sing songs and do little dances on the street and the car would stop the observation car would stop and while the children would perform and it was really old-time home spun entertainment i guess not very sophisticated but it certainly was well regarded in its day the car is now heading south on dunbar and continuing south on dunbar the these dunbar and the dunbar lines were served by two-man cars now here's some of the entertainment we have a little girl playing an accordion um the streetcar approaching is one of the what we're called the hastings east steel cars these are built by canadian car and founder in about 1926. the car in the background is one of the brill streetcars we're now turning the corner onto 41st avenue at dunbar and then the car is going to y at this point now the observation car routing was altered during the diminishing years of street railway service and this was taken later on when the carousel line was not available for service but at one time they used to make a big one-way loop in this case they've run both ways on dunbar so my earlier comment on the routing was the one that was in effect prior to the time these pictures were taken now we're again heading north on dunbar we've come to 16th avenue the diversion and then again we'll head north on dunbar down towards broadway there were two observation cars number 123 and 124 and then in the early years they were backed up by another car number 29 which was really a city street car that had the top removed from the window railing upwards and this car helped out in busy times when three cars were needed however when the war came along there was such a demand for ridership on the system that number 29 was put into the kits line of shops and rebuilt into a conventional streetcar and served until the end of street railway service and regular passenger service we've now crossed the granville bridge and we're coming up to pacific and granville and making the s turn to go north on granville north of pacific of course this is all radically changed now with the new granville bridge and it's hard to identify these scenes and relate them to the present day situation this is coming up to davey and granville there's one of the pcc cars coming southbound on the kitsolina line there were 36 pcc cars on the vancouver system the car the observation car now is just turning off granville onto hastings street and then this scene is approaching victory square which is the completion of the the run and the passengers are disembarking here and then the observation car will run um deadhead to prior barns and then resume another trip at a later time again a facial twin coat fadeville gas bus is showing up there and of course is indicating the shape of things to come as the system will gradually be converted and the facial gas buses uh served as an interim measure when the lines were being stripped of trolley overhead and were put in service until the trolley coach overhead could be put in place so they served on many of the lines on interim basis and so the observation car in this case looks to be heading back onto camby street and ready for another trip we're going to take a trip on the fairview belt lines now the fairview belt lines and this picture is taken at broadway in maine and this cars has just turned off eastbound broadway to northbound main and is coming down to 7th and main the belt lines were very old lines and operated via broadway main hastings granville broadway in both directions and so they were known as the inner and outer belt lines this scene is on the outer belt line as we're traveling northbound on main street down towards first avenue they were extremely busy lines and probably the busiest portion was on the section along broadway between maine and granville street and of course in subsequent years with the revision of the trolley coach or introduction of the trolley coach lines the broadway crosstown line was introduced which eliminated the transfers that people were required to make at main street and at granville so both maine and granville were very busy points on this line these sections along main street and hastings were not as busy as the portion along broadway we're continuing north on main street just passing what was now the main street or science center station on skytrain and the via terminal would be to our right and coming up to pryor street and of course pryor street has great significance in that this is where prior car barns were where many of the vancouver streetcars were housed and you can see prior barns just to the left there and the old cobalt cobalt hotel is just to the left and now today the greyhound bus lines have a garage and maintenance center on the site of the old prior car barns we're coming north on main street to overtaking a pacific stage line's inner city bus and of course the brill trolley coaches are in evidence these pictures having been taken during the period when the system was undergoing changeover from streetcars to trolley coaches and and buses a ptc car making an unusual turn at maine and hastings having probably come from prior barns and going into service on hastings street and turning north on hastings and as was commented on earlier in the tape by frank when he was relating to the central park line the intersection at maine and hastings was called a grand union and all directions could be made by street cars ninja urbans the only grand union on the system in vancouver maine and hastings was a major point on the system there were always a traffic inspectors at that point regulating the cars and now we've made a turn onto hastings coming down towards columbia you can see the carroll street into urban depot and the head offices of the bc electric company just to the left we have a trolley coach crossing in front of us on columbia street and then again coming to the inter urban depot at carroll street you can see the neon sign interurban train depot just on the left now this is looking the other way from the interurban depot east on hastings street proceeding west on hastings we're passing woodward's so that hasn't changed woodward's is still here and also the cenotaph at victory squares were coming up towards camby street note the safety zones in the street the streetcars had one disadvantage of course and the passengers had to come out into the middle of the street to board and the boarding areas were marked by safety zones so that automobiles would steer around these and keep passengers protected we see a mixture on the street of pcc cars some of the one-man steel cars which were in different assignment route assignments during the latter days of the street railway operation the pcc cars originally were assigned to the victoria and the joist lines and operated on those as well as the catsalina line exclusively but in the latter days they were assigned to the hastings east on the grand view lines after those earlier routes had been converted so we're now on hastings street at granville and now see one of the fairview cars turning from hastings to southbound granville and followed by pcc car 14 hastings this now of course is a transit mall the granville mall extends from hastings right through to nelson street and is dedicated to transit vehicles only you'll note this is dunsmore street and note all the storefront in evidence of course this is now at the pacific mall and there are very few storefronts in place this is georgia street with hudson's bay store in the background and coming to robson street there seems to be a gap in the streetcar service at this point which is rather unusual because the transit ridership was very high on the system just after the war or particularly during the war and most lines had very close headways i might comment on some of the cars we're seeing that streetcar coming towards us is one of the narragansett types which were built by the bc electric and their new westminster shops um and were remodeled they formerly had a deck roof and you'll see this car has an arch roof and these cars were quite radically rebuilt and equipped with leather seats and done very attractively because the system was in need of renovation and prior to the war there was an extensive program of rebuilding of the old cars really no improvement in the technology the cars but a matter of providing new bodies and more comfortable seats and more attractive lighting etc which carried the system through the warriors and into the post-war period at which time the decision was made to abandon the rail system and convert to trolley coach and buses now coming onto granville bridge the old granville bridge at pacific and granville and heading southbound on the bridge and shortly we'll go through the swing span and already the trolley coaches are sharing the overhead with the streetcars on the granville bridge minimal traffic on the bridge but cars of course were not in the numbers that they are today and transit was still the major way to get around the city and of course still is in many instances but car ownership wasn't nearly what it is today we're keeping pace with some of the brittle trolleys you note the bc electric insignia on the trolley coaches because this was still in the period of bc electric approaching 4th avenue and granville at the south end of the bridge and then going south from 4th avenue up the hill to to broadway now we're on the still on the outer belt line of course you'll note on the old cars they had very large number boxes on the front and the numbers are very easy to distinguish and in comparison when you look at the trolley coaches that we've seen in the picture the numbers were much smaller because of the design of the vehicles and it wasn't as easy to identify the the number or the root number of the vehicle as it was in the old streetcar days rounding the curve from southbound granville to eastbound broadway and this was a timing point on the line sometimes the cars would sit here for one or two minutes making up their departure time and now heading east towards the next transfer point which will be oak street passing a fairview inner one of the narragansett rebuilt cars on the fairview inner and here's our fairview outer coming along again this is one of the rebuilt narragansett cars with the bulging sides which was characteristic of that particular group of cars hard to imagine that this is broadway when one sees the volume of traffic on that street today as i make this commentary of course it's august 1990 these pictures were taken probably in the early 1950s so we're looking back about at least 40 years oak street fairview enter this was one of the brill cars that came towards us and they too were rebuilt and modernized and this is a real car pictured here it looks as though it's just come out of the shops there was a regular repainting program and it was easy to identify the cars that come out of the shop they would come out glistening and stay that way for a few months and then gradually get rather grimy looking until they were again put in the paint shop all that type of work was done at the kits liner shops at the south end of brevard bridge i think that particular car is 391 but i can't tell for sure now we've passed camby street and are heading east along broadway past columbia and manitoba streets etc up the grade towards main street you note the rather poor condition of the street the a lot of the pavement in between the car tracks was rather poor where it had been uprooted for repairing of the tracks and in many cases there were wooden blocks or concrete blocks or bricks between the tracks and made for rather rough operation of automobiles coming up towards main street you can see the lee building which is still at broadway in maine and there seems to be a lot of track repair work judging by the patches and the in the pavement on either side of the rails and approaching broadway and main now this picture of course shows a trolley coach on broadway so um that is a complete circuit now on the fairview outer beltline uh this is frank horn again and i'm going to take you back to the fraser valley line this again is over about 40 years since the film was uh made and uh the commentary has been done in 1990 now that's a typical uh consist of a chilliwack line with a baggage car express car and a head end and one or two coaches behind here's a picture of vic sherman and his wife and family and they're going to take the last trip and they're in here at liverpool road station uh which is um right at scott road where scott road crosses the uh the the fraser valley line now and there's a sign there we'll show you a close-up of it in a second uh stating that uh the last trip on on the chilliwack line and the pastures here with october 1st it's sure nice to have vic right here with us because he's filling us in on a lot of stuff here that we didn't all know about pretty soon we're oh there's the uh train all the last trip going up to langley and uh or the last trip to chilliwack and they meet at langley all decorated up for their ceremonies for the uh last trip this is taking red langley now you'll see the train pulling into langley for the ceremonies he looks like he's coming from chilliwack he has a comment on there the two trains met at langley and then there was a ceremony with the officials and so on the two trains touched noses and uh i was there at the time that was rather a sad occasion i thought you know well i'm going to give the mic to vic here just for a second while this uh ceremonies are on he'll be able to explain it to you better here's the train coming from vancouver to the langley station headed by one of the cannot cars the 1309 1011 series and of course decorated up in the ready kilowatt uh the two trains have now touched noses and in that last picture although we can't really see them is mr grower who was president of the bc electric at the time and ivor neal who had been appointed general manager of transportation and so that was the closing ceremony now i think the picture is going to take us back to the carroll street station where the baggage section would leave early in the morning a few minutes ahead of the passenger section to allow for the loading of mail and express at new westminster and then the passenger section which is shown leaving now would meet that section at new westminster where they would couple up and then run together as a single train through to chilliwack well frank you're the interurban motorman so i think you should take over now and tell us where we're going well thank you it's very interesting though you were at those last ceremonies there's one of the cool ones coming out with the round windows there we always said they look like an owl coming at you they were a nice comfortable car though uh here's the baggage express car that's half an hour ahead of the passenger coach coming down commercial drive about 6th avenue just about to cross over the bridge at the great northern cut or which is the burlington northern now there's the bridge with uh one of the grand view streetcars crossing the great northern bridge here comes the pasture section of the chilliwack he's uh he just eyeballs right through he doesn't make any stops till he gets to new westminster and then he couples up with the baggage car for many many years they run two and three car trains uh sometimes four but laterally they were the pastor travel was cut down and they were only traveling with the express car and the one coach like they are on this scene that's the gladstone trestle coming into nanaimo road station here and that's nanaimo station on the skytrain now that's the passenger section of the chilliwack yeah here's the baggage car coming down on the columbia street gonna head into track three at the u.s minister depot that building now is the value village if you go in that building you can still see the posts going through on the angle which divided the three tracks here comes the passenger section here's a scene that you don't see too often this is friday morning market special coming in from mount lehman uh he's pulling into track two that'll be the uh central park on track one the market special on track two and the number two on the chilliwack ready to leave he's been loading the mail and baggage express just about ready to go now there's the parking ramp is right behind that depot now but this is many years ago here he goes we're on our way to chilliwack comes out and runs down front street there we got all them tracks there he's on the bc electric track is the first one then the cpr then the cnr and then the great northern tracks all in the side beside there now he's heading up the ramp towards the bridge quite a steep little incline now we're right up on the fraser river bridge now this is shared by the canadian national railroad the great northern railroad which is now burlington northern and also the uh used to be the bc electric it changed to bc hydro and now it's called the fraser valley and southern if i'm not mistaken is that uh hit you right there uh vic yeah the locomotives have southern british columbia on them um but i'm not sure what the full name of the new yeah it is it was acquired from bc hydro yeah the bc hydro did sell it to some it isn't a us outfit that owns it now there's the baggage car coming on the south end of the fraser river bridge you'll notice the trestle goes into three bc electric went straight ahead the great northern went to the right and the other one to the left the cn now he's coming off the ramp heading towards liverpool road station where we saw vickery's wife getting on that's the station just in the in the distance there that was also known as shops because it apparently when they first put the chilliwag line in they were going to put huge railroad shops there but they never did materialize here we're coming around the bend to old yale road which is southwest mister station this is where the freight starts to grind when he's pulling a heavy train up here that's quite a pull it's about three percent great up here yes yeah we're just we've gone past your throat station we're heading towards scott road station he crosses scott's world twice within a mile or so here this is the first crossing at scott road and he just dips into the municipality of delta north delta out of surrey just for a very short distance as he goes around the bend he's climbing up there and he goes past 96th avenue crosses scott road for the second time and comes to kennedy station there's a big sighting at kennedy station where the freight if you had too many tons you had to take the first cut up and put it in the siding and run back get the tail end of the train and bring it up kennedy siding was at the top of the hill it's very populated there now frank i note the viewers may notice that the trolley pole arrangement on the trains this train is different to what was on the central park line you notice that the front trolley pole on the baggage car was pulled down and the pole on the rear car was was up uh i gathered there was a reason for that in case the pole broke on the front car or the back car at least it would fall onto the right-of-way do you remember that as being the reason for that pole configuration yeah apparently that if the pole did come loose it would go right down the aisle of the coach so they've always went with the back car well we're traveling right along here we're down at sullivan station now we've across the king george highway and this is sullivan he's coming into uh the film eliminates uh several hunt road craigs and newton stations now we're coming call this is the serpentine river and this is where we crosses highway 10 at mccollum station now he's coming towards cloverdale that is the old highway 99 cloverdale station you'll get a glimpse of the old soul substation here which has just recently been torn down or knocked down it was all solid concrete there's the station the depot that's the grain elevator and in the distance is the substation that square roof building that with the ivy all over did i don't know if there was just a short glimpse now we're on our way we're going to heading for halls prairie which was a meeting point for the trains siding and also a station he's moving right along here you can see by the way the cameraman's bouncing there that's hullsbury station just around the bend is the sighting all is very exciting now they're braking's out there getting the switch to taking the hole there here comes the baggage cart and all lined up he's on his way that was the most common setup two coaches on the back with a baggage car on the head end that was number two left in the morning oh he's leaving halls prairie he's getting by uh uh hunter and anderson this will be anderson station now just about hunter is where the new bypass cuts off the the main line doesn't go through a langley berry anymore turns off and bypasses langley about hunter station that's hunter coming up there it veers off to the left of the main line now there's langley station he's coming into langley now this is the uh the blue mail truck there he's picking the mail up off the baggage car and the traffic there was the uh that was the old yale roll or road or trans-canada highway at that time uh these are just shots around langley uh taken of all the the newer buildings and to show how what it looked like in those days which it was a growing town langley there's the brachman kerr building the railroad went right alongside of it there's some more stores pretty modern little town for around the late 40s early 50s that's the transcanada highway there's the schedule board on the side of the station let you know which ti what the time the trains are due in both directions there he goes he's leaving langley by right by the brickman curve and he's going by norris now this is where the bypass the new railroad cuts back in and it goes right along the side of highway 10. this is mill in our station it's all pretty well perfectly flat right here and you could he could get it rolling real good these pitches are obviously taking taken from an automobile going on highway 10 right parallel to the track right now that this part of the track is shared by the cncp and the the fraser valley line for the coal trains they cut off at a harmsworth station which is just a couple of stations up the line here we come to jardine first jaradine is where the road cuts off to go to fort langley there he's around on the bend there's jardine station and right just about here it must be where the freeway goes underneath the uh of the line now he's starting to climb a wee bit here uh not too bad yet that he's coming around to harms worth and at harmsworth station is where the uh coal line cuts off and it goes over to the cn that's harms worth there now we're starting up spurling hill it's so do [Music] yeah that's quite a long hill it's quite a pull for the freight train and but this is spurling station he's coming into here and i don't know the name of that crossing there but it just around the bend is spreading and he's on the top of the hill now that's the whistle board for spurling and he went whistling right by spurling there he's coming to war hope next oh there's the whistle board are you slowing down i picked that lady up at war hoop the next station is uh kind of a little bit of a land market they apparently leaving the old uh substation there at coughlan and you'll notice the uh milk stand where the uh one of the many many stand milk stands all along the line when they had the milk train on and at coughlin station there's the substation right across the track there's the milk stand right by the station you'll you'll see them pick up their milk cans in the sick or deposit some more now he's depositing some more empty cans so that the farmer can fill them up and be ready for the milk train in the morning there he goes the next station is county line one of the few overpasses where the road goes over the track and the uh fellow that was taking the film here he's was standing obviously up on top of the uh overpass looking down that's a county line station there and he reverses to the other side of the bridge to catch and going the other way now we get to beaver river now beaver river was mostly for a sighting for the freight but the passengers could have light and if you look sharply just between the siding track and the main line you'll see uh some ties spread out there that was so that the passengers didn't have such a high step to get down there's the milk stand here's the signing for beaver river you notice some ties in the middle of the track that was the station platform that little building on the side is just a phone booth that wasn't a as a depot that's by jackman he's heading for lombard that's a lombard station now iran state is omitted but that's bradner up ahead that's the general store that white building and that's the that's bradner station there's a siding there quite often the freight wouldn't pull in there to eat it was dinner time by the time he got the bradner now we're heading towards denison it was also a sighting at denison just past the station now we're on our way to mount lehman and drifts into mount lehman pretty quick it's where she drops over and starts down the mount lehman hill around this bend and then be at mount lehman station when i was breaking in as a motorman here i was with a motorman called al powys and uh a horse got on the track two of them i had to chase them halfway down mount lehman hill and al was really worried i was going to scare them and chase them onto a trestle and apparently if they get on the trestle they fall through this is a steep hill down here and it winds around down mount lehman the horses run down the side off the track anyway [Music] yeah i saw the milk stand there that we just passed i don't know if we get a shot of that oh no we didn't met that little trestle where the horses went down the ravine this is coming right out on the masque prairie now that's gifford station there's wow we went by there in a hurry didn't we now there's glover we're going by and that way in the distance is uh claiborne now this is where we cross the uh cpr track and the breakman's got to get out and go and lock himself in this little room by throwing them levers if he doesn't throw him right he can't get out i'll show you where the little house is in a second that's mount lima station and right in the foreground there is a little house where this signal and the brakeman when he goes in he throws these four big levers and it puts the sig uh oh you notice the mail dropping off there for the mail truck oh boy he's gone already uh you'll notice the signal go down there now that's got stopped for the cpr and then there's a time clock there and then he pulls the last signal and gets the permission for us to cross then they have to stop on the other side and the brakeman has to reverse all four levers and then he can get out open the door the first level lever puts a uh bolt right through the bottom of the door and you can't open it we're going to do a little high-speed traveling here now from claiborne to past mount necklace [Music] yeah i said mount nicholas i don't know it was saint nicholas a little station very seldom used but it uh it was both stations were a long ways apart here from claiborne to abbotsford and this is a picture obviously shot from the back end of the car automobile on the highway from abbotsford to mission now we got a uh on the chilliwack line the motormen used to pack their own whistles and they were a high pitched one quite a bit different than the muffled ones they used to use in town they were so shrill that the people that built the houses right next to the track used to complain about the noise so all they were all muffled ones in town but the chilliwack motorman were allowed to put the three-tone shrill whistle on which sounded way more like a train yeah he's pulling into abbotsford you'll notice that truck is waiting there for the mail boy they just throw it in and the way he's gone that's when the royal mail used to move fast now we uh we're getting you some a few shots of abbotsford what average word used to look like in the late 40s early 50s a sign there it says vancouver 42 miles in chilliwack about i think 25 it's in oh you're more than halfway just more shots of abbotsford clean little town there's a ba gas station now this one uh we're kind of uh at sea here we don't know where that but i assume that is where the cpr runs through abbotsford because it's only a few hundred feet over from from our main line is the cp main line now i imagine that there's a steam engine at abbotsford well we're on our way out of abbotsford towards we just went under the trans-canada highway and we'll go by the lair station there's delay delayer and the next one is vi road and we're getting when we get the vi we're very close to the uh interchange at uh huntington that was a big interchange that the bc electric used to bring all the bananas down from the northern pacific railway and also the milwaukee it's a switch just this is by station there's a little switch on the right hand side and we used to drop the whole train by put the engine and then that whole train and run into the hole there a little farther on you'll notice one of the 940s one of the brand new diesels that they bought around about 1948 sitting in there that was the start of the beginning of the end of the trolley wire areas coming around the bend crossing the highway that goes from abbotsford to sumas and that's the depot at uh huntington there was a man and his wife usually there all the time in that house and it was also the depot and there they went out the back door they were in the united states it was almost right on the border there now we're heading we're missing a whole bunch of stations here there's watkin road there's uh south sumas there's arnold there's norton and we arrive now at the bar house at veda mountain and there's a station better mountain station just around the corner and just as we leave here there's a couple of deer on the track there and uh they don't know which way to go we'll cut there they go look at them and then they nice looking little deer whitetails oh we didn't get them they got off the track in time and we go around we're going past reclaim you notice all that grass down there was 30 feet of water before they drained lake sumac and there's reclaim and kid but the next station we'll see will be bell rose that's the siding down to uh kid or pardon me down to reclaim i was sitting in the siding with a motorman on a freight train one time when i was a young feller and i said why did they cut all these cuts and rock cuts all around the mountain and they could have built the railroad right down there on the flat and he looked at me and said good when i was your age there was 30 feet of water we'd get out and have a swim there it was old howard mortison very dry hoover but here's bellerose and that's uh ken hudson's car parked there he's up in the bushes taking the picture there you can see the farmlands in the distance it's all flat it must have been a very shallow lake but it was huge here we go by a couple more stations here sinclair there's siding at sinclair and stewart stewart stations right right in here and we're just about the end of the vetter mountain we'll come out the yarrow and very shortly it was quite a community at yarrow yeah that looks like some of the buildings at the arrow that was a breakman on three and eight and he used to leave vancouver about 5 30 at night and when we got the arrow i always felt i was getting close to the end of the line seemed to take forever to get up there and all dark now we're leaving yarrow and there's quite a fill across here it's uh it gets to the vetter canal where we have a steel truss bridge going across a better canal the reason they call it the vetter canal because i think the the uh vetter river used to run into sue mass lake and then out into the fraser so when they drained sumas lake they had to dyke the vetter and then they called it the vetter canal because the the vetter river is higher than the land right here you notice we're on a field all the way through here this is a very little use station it was a vetter river hugh fisherman used to get off there there's the steel truss trestle we're looking back now towards new westminster and you see the better mountain and the distance behind as well as soon as we get over this bridge here and we'll be long we'll be at uh woodruff i used to be a logging road cross here at woodruff it's very very busy i guess i imagine it crossed here and went over to the cn line [Music] all i remember it was abandoned but i remember the diamond and the tracks were still there well looks like we're getting by lickman now there's lickman there's south sumas and there's evans station along here after we leave evans we'll be coming into sardis there's a trestle just before sardis you'll see the traffic going across that road that's going up to call this lake here again there's a mailman with a truck waiting there now it's perfectly straight perfectly flat and go past knight road station at night road then the next thing you come to is the diamond for the cn signal tower there's the distance signal for the diamond that's the interchange for the uh cn that's the home signal there's the signal tower and there's the cn main line now we're coming into the loop in the chilliwack depot notice the cows are feeding there and in the middle of the loop there peaceful setting they don't even look at the train he couldn't care less there again is the mail truck away goes to her majesty's mail to be delivered on time now we're going to have a lot of shots around chilliwack i not too familiar with the downtown are you uh vic it's just shots of the downtown chilliwagon yes uh well it shows chilliwack is a very quiet area and um i must say frank in looking at this footage it's brought back a lot of memories i assisted ken hodgson in taking these films by driving the car for him and so we had a lot of fun in in making this film so it's been rather enjoyable thinking back to those days a lot of time and effort went into it as you can imagine to catch the various scenes along the way um your comments are interesting frank you know the line intimately and it's been very interesting well uh thanks vic pretty soon we're gonna start heading back and uh they're just random shots and there's no word a way to identify them unless we see stations or road crossings but it gets it gets to be redundant to come to have a commentary all the way back because it would be the same as coming up if even if we could trace them there are some nice cars i'd sure like to have one of them today in that shape i worked three and eight for a while and uh used after the brakeman had to sleep uh up in chilliwack the conductor lived in chilliwack and uh the brakeman had to sleep in a bunk house up above the car barn and you call you leave chilliwack at eight in the morning and get back into vancouver about 10 30 11 o'clock i worked it for about three months seven days a week made good money on it but you sure didn't see much your family in that three months now we're heading back out of the loop now it's complete loop around chilliwack in those days you didn't have to change ends or anything there's the cn tower on the way back some beautiful country beautiful scenes here that sure brings back a lot of memories for me too uh notice the poles there they've uh and and the new right away they've got all that new ballast all down there and spread out nice and even and most of the line had poles on both sides with the trolley to hold it up but every once in a while they'd put them steel arms out which i guess were a lot more efficient and a lot less expensive than having a double pole line all the way to those poles uh weren't just to hold the trolley wire up they were also a high tension line had to be extremely careful frank i guess you'll notice that the consists in that train is a niles built baggage car as opposed to the american car company built car that came up on the train from vancouver and these were arch roof cars and matched the arch roof of the cannot passenger car behind so quite a different consist on the return trip yeah i noticed when i used to be a motor one on there we used to like to get the 1700 it was a i think it was a ottawa car uh can anybody correct me on that american car yeah american car company right yeah and it was so much better built and everything and i i didn't know until recently that it was in a head-on collision with a one of the 970 freight engines at cloverdale and it was sat behind kitsalina barn as a wreck for several years and they rebuilt it and i know whenever i motored it i thought gee this is a nice car in good shape but i didn't realize it had been rebuilt where the niles cars were getting pretty rickety they were identical motors and everything in the controllers number two was the one that went up in the morning and come back as number five then they had four and seven uh four used to leave uh about two in the afternoon and get back up at nine o'clock into westminster and then the central park fellas would take the number four back from westminster to vancouver and then three and eight was three used to come down in the morning at eight o'clock and it was eight number eight going back up around about 5 30 at left vancouver you know there's uh what front street used to look like them boxcars are on the great northern track and the great northern interchange uh waiting for the beast likely to pick them up or the beast electric have left them there for the great northern to pick up as the tracks go over there's the great northern the cn the cp and the bc electric there he's going into the back of the value village there uh he's coming up another interesting thing here when the freight train went through that one point switch it was a city switch and you used to have to put a great big track nut in there throw the switch and put the track nut in so that the switch couldn't flop over when all the box cars were going over it and then the tail end break when he sometimes had a hard time getting that nut out of there because it would get wedged in and you'd have to jab at it a couple of times with a switch iron and uh pick it up and then run after the caboose to get on here's the sad part the the old this is the l4 they had a couple of these uh the l6 nail form but they're taking the wire down picking it all up and a story i heard i don't know how true it is or not but they had several huge roles of this copper trolley wire by the track and they went to pick it up in the morning and it was all gone somebody come along in a truck in the middle of the night and very valuable uh commodity that copper they got it down a lot quicker than they put it up a bit one thing watching this film i can't see how that trolley one can keep that trolley on the wire that the wire is so slack but yet that trolley seems to stay right on there see they cut all the guys and get some great big cutters and he sniffs them right off and then the charlie wire drops loose but they obviously know what they're doing i was a motorman not alignment this is a sad scene but wait a few more minutes you'll see the saddest one now there's one of the niles baggage car it's been all stripped of all the metal inside the brass so it's all taken out of it and they got a couple of cables on here she's pretty rickety too now she won't give up though there she's gonna go to sleep now see all the street cars along them behind there this is taking that kits a line of barns where they'd where they uh scrapped all the cars and burnt them and there's a string of street cars there already ready for the same fate now they've torched it now away she goes that shot of the lion car taking the wire down was sad but this is the saddest one to me of course my father was a retired bc electric motorman on the marple steveston line and i was on there for a while my brother-in-law retired from the bc electric he was a dispatcher so it's kind of in the family my father was also on the transit side not on the interurban frank but on the city streetcar lines as a motorman and an instructor and a supervisor etc so i guess it runs in the family and it's in the blood isn't it yeah it sure is yeah but this this film is just uh i just can't believe that somebody's had this so long and i hadn't seen it there's not much left or i guess that wood was so dry it would be this would be about i guess it'd be about 40 years old i guess they were built around approximately 1910 and this would be about 1950 or they would have all had to been rebuilt and then they they were they were actually obsolete because there were so many faster and lighter cars so it'd been very very expensive to rebuild them or buy brand new ones at that time things are getting pretty hot around there by the look of that fire hose it's right below broad bridge there's one of the old wooden freight motors mother looks over there he's probably ready for the burn too the torch i think it was actually a snow sweeper that uh freight motor you thought there was a snow sweeper you know that had the bamboo brushes and space to clear the tracks anyway i guess this is the end of the line totally for the fraser valley line and the equipment and the most interesting amount of film depicting quite an interesting era in the local transportation scene and now we jump to 1998 the downtown historic railway and here is vik sharman one of our instructors having some fun with some ladies in period costumes that were invited for from the city and here's interurban car 1207 driven by don bellamy being pulled out for the first time at the official opening this is at moberly and 6th avenue also known as a legend boot station nice lovely sunny day on this opening here we are looking westbound the car coming back to legends boot station and they're off in the distance is the car coming from granville island back to lagon boot it's called a legend boot station because back at the turn of the century a uh the police found an actual leg in a boot which is one of vancouver's many unsolved murder mysteries car 1207 here was strictly on display in 1997 there was no wire and here in 1998 we operated from mobilion6 which we are standing at looking west to granville island car 1207 was built in new westminster in 1905. here we have frank horn one of our other instructors he's just put that pole up and he's pulled this one down now the car is ready to go back to granville island for another trip you can see the car here another angle of it pole is up at the back and down at the front ready to go back and here we have the inside of the car and a lot of trip people on this trip number of passengers car very well um done up and here we are off to granville island with the flag people holding back to traffic this particular line of track was previous previously owned by the canadian pacific railways cpr and was leased to the bc electric railway there was never any passenger service ever operated on this fall street track since it only ran to yukon street east of yukon was a great northern railway and we are panning over to frank horn and as you notice he is standing which is normally the way that the motormen were at in the city they ended up standing while driving better view of any obstructions and people running in front of their cars and here we are slowing down because there's a break in the break in the in the wall and back on our way to granble island bc electric railway service these industries with electric freight locomotives slowing down here to say hi to someone and then we'll be on our way back westbound towards uh granville island from granville island to yukon a two kilometer track was bought by the city of vancouver from the canadian pacific railway for nine million dollars and from yukon to main street which is another one kilometers was bought for six hundred thousand frank horn that you see here driving and vic sharm that you've already seen at the beginning and don bellamy are are were our three instructors from the very beginning all three of them have experience driving these into urbans before they were retired in the 1950s and we're pulling into gravel island and looks like frank is making a nice smooth stop and as you can see we end up staying here for a little bit in order to and we unload from the back and reload from the front as you see from here another view from inside and on our way back to mobility and sixth avenue legend boot station legend boot station is now half of the halfway point because of the extension that has occurred to ontario and first avenue and last year in 2001 extension to quebec street and we see off in the distance the interurban coming back coming back into granville island station this was term a double-ended car because you had the two poles so you notice the pole is up at the rear and so when you pull in here you would end up putting the pole up at the front which would then end up being the rear and then switching over to the other end and pulling that pole down and looks like frank is teaching angus mcintyre another one of our members as you can see we disembark now from the rear of the coach the conductor will quickly jump on shut the doors move to the front and load up and here we see frank make doing some instruction and showing some of the passengers what we had to do now you see the pole is up at the rear pulled at the front and ready to head back and there is angus mcintyre he's our treasurer and there's frank horn frank drove for the bc electric from 1946 to 1951 on the burnaby lake central park and chilliwack lines and then worked from 1951 until 1985 for the great northern railway we are now proceeding from granville island here heading east towards legend booth station like i said before 1207 was on display only in 1997. it operated from granville island to mobile insects legend booth station in 1998 an extension to ontario on first avenue was in 1999 when car 1231 joined the fleet and then eventually an extension to quebec street in 2001. this is a nice straight track as you can see and so it was a an opportunity for all of us to open it up and there is angus with frank and opening the speed up in notches and then shutting it right back and just letting it roll and as we approach mobile and six we will have to slow down and wait for the flag people to give us permission to come through after they have stopped the traffic and here we go this is angus mcintyre driving so we'll see if he can make a nice easy stop and yes he does there's 1207 heading back flag people running up to stop the traffic allowing it to head back to granville island and there's dale laird superintendent today he was a flag person and here we are in 2001 we're looking east and we have car 1231 approaching the passing track car 1231 is a saint louis car built in 19 1912 and it'll sit on the passing track waiting for interurban car 1207 coming from granville island to pass on the northern track and here it comes there it goes towards ontario and first avenue and eventually quebec street at this time i'd like to thank vic sherman and the late ken hodgins for making the original footage thanks also to vic sharman and frank horn for their commentary which was added in 1990 40 years after the original footage was taken here we see car approaching coming up the three percent great car 1207 coming back from quebec street and there it goes thanks to bc transit for restoring and turbine car 1207 we see taken off going towards granville island thanks to mayor philippone of vancouver and city councillors for their support and continued financial support of the downtown historic railway thanks also to former vancouver councillors don bellamy vic sherman and frank horn for being at the downtown historic railway nearly every weekend over the past four years training all of us volunteers thanks also to jessie jihoody of aaa movies for helping produce this video here we hear they see the car coming down to three percent grade coming down quite quickly car 1231 and there goes vic sherman and his wife in front of car 1231 and there's car 1231 again the downtown historic railway uh see you later would not be around without the vision of dale laird our superintendent so come on down and ride we run from may to october and uh saturdays sundays and holidays there's don bellamy see you later don see you next year so come on down and ride with us my name is david aslan and i'm the president of the transit museum society and it was nice having you along for the ride today you

Channel: Mycroft Kuroba

Views: 5,085

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Id: hnuVCgn-W1Y

Length: 128min 44sec (7724 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 08 2021