Man: A little more west... Slightly... Man 2: We're right on top of it. I'm right on top of it right now. Man 1: This is where it's at. That info came right from L.A. Department of Water and Power. And that way the other one's around again. Nathan: You guys know what to look for, right? Man: Mermaids. [Laughter] Nathan: Good luck. This episode of "Lost LA" was made possible in part by a grant from Anne Ray Foundation, a Margaret A. Cargill philanthropy, and the Frieda Berlinski Foundation. Only a century ago, L.A. boasted the largest rail transit network in America. Long before freeways, long before bumper-to-bumper traffic, the Pacific Electric Railway moved L.A. For 3 generations, its red cars defined the look and sound of L.A. streets. Whistles blowing, wheels clattering, more than 1,000 miles of track. The red cars also drove L.A.'s economy. This was how working-class Angelenos commuted to their jobs every day. And then, on April 9th, 1961, the red cars suddenly fell silent. At 3:45 in the morning, the final red car rumbled down line 36 from downtown L.A. and into oblivion. So, where did all those red cars go? Most were sold for scrap. Some went to museums. Others became long, narrow houses. A few turned up in Argentina. And a small number took the plunge, dropped into the waters off Redondo Beach to create an artificial reef. And that's why we're out here-- to see if, after all these years, we can locate an old, red car somewhere deep down in its watery grave. Whoa! [Laughs] Man: That's awesome. They found it. Nathan: I know! Found something, right. [Laughs] My excitement got the better of me. That wasn't a red car at all. Just an old, sunken vessel known to divers as the landing craft. 70 years later, 70 years in the salt water. [Laughs] Woman: And water's good? Man: It is. Yeah. It is pretty good. Woman: How far...? Man: Probably, I don't know. 25 feet. Shaun: I think that's optimistic. Ha ha! I think 15 to 20. Man: 20 feet? Shaun: Yeah. Nathan: Starting to worry we sent you on a wild goose chase. There's no way the sea would've eaten it up completely, right? Man: It--it could have sank in the sand. Eventually, that's what'll happen, because it's heavy, and when the sand moves, it kind of moves around it. You ever stand right in the surf zone and the waves come in and when they go back out, it washes the sand away from your feet and you kind of sink? That kind of thing? 10 years ago, you know, my friend said he saw the ones up right outside of Redondo. They were intact still. Somewhat some structure. And then 5 years ago, they said all they saw was the wheels, the trucks up there. Nathan: That's kind of become more of an urban legend than anything else now. [Laughs] Michael: Yeah, I think it's turning it into a harder task than we thought. [Both chuckle] Nathan: We didn't have much luck on the water. But I suspected we could still find traces of the red car system right here on dry land. I met up with 3 friends who know how to uncover the secrets of old L.A. Lila Higgins, an entomologist. Daveed Kapoor, an architect. And Victoria Bernal, a public historian. We set out for the old Belmont substation near downtown, with a few stops along the way. As early as 1887, L.A.'s electric trolleys began to connect to the suburbs and along the coast. Railway owners hoped that extending their lines across undeveloped land would boost real estate development, and they were right. Developers like Henry Huntington took advantage of the situation and began to build what we now know as the L.A. sprawl. Later, in the 1920s, the Pacific Electric tried to modernize its aging system with a shortcut, a subway tunnel under congested downtown so trains could avoid all those clogged streets above. All right, ready? The tunnel is still there, a mile long underneath Bunker Hill. So, have you all seen "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"? It actually presents a conspiracy theory, right, that there were these sort of nefarious forces operating behind the scenes that were behind the downfall of the red car. Lila: The corporate elite? Nathan: Yeah, like the biggest corporations in America. General Motors and the--the tire interests, and-- Victoria: That's a bit of an oversimplification of what really happened, don't you think? Nathan: Totally. Yeah, well, there were, I mean, I guess lots of different explanations, right? There's changing consumer preferences, right? I mean, like, some people just kind of preferred the automobile, right? Lila: Individuality in America. Like, you can be in control of when you're leaving, when you're coming and going. You don't have to worry about, like, waiting for a train. Victoria: Well, and then there's Eric Avila's book "Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight," in which he states that in 1915, L.A. County was leading the nation in automobile ownership, and that was happening as soon as 1915. So, that just increased. Daveed: And that was tied up with, like, the Progressive movement, right? 'Cause people saw the railcar executives as like these rich barons, you know, and they were like, so, stick it to the rich railcar executive and get a car. It was like the progressive thing to do. Nathan: And then there's the fact that, like, the Pacific Electric was-- like, there was a lot of underinvestment in it, right? Like, they didn't really keep it up well. In fact, it was by, what, the 1940s or even 1930s, it was already sort of an antiquated system, right? Victoria: The underinvestment is helped by Harry Chandler, head of the "L.A. Times." I mean, he had major investments in Goodyear Tire Rubber Company, in Union Oil, in the gravel-- rock and gravel company, a construction company. So, the "L.A. Times" is advocating against subsidizing funds to improve the system while supporting municipal investment in roadways. Daveed: But then the people getting cars made the trains run slow. It kind of ruined it, right, 'cause then the trains are stuck in traffic, too. Victoria: Right. Daveed: Because they all had to share the same road. Victoria: Right. Nathan: Yeah, it could take forever to get to, like, Hollywood, for instance. That's why they built this, right? To make it a lot quicker to get to-- it was called the Hollywood Subway. Daveed: Right. And it saved a lot of time, supposedly. Victoria: Yeah, it did. Daveed: But yeah, 1911, to get from 6th and Main to Aliso Street was sometimes longer than getting from Aliso Street to Pasadena, 'cause downtown was just so congested. There were people and other trains and cars. I mean, cars really ruined it all. Nathan: Watch your step here, everyone. Lila: Thanks. Nathan: Does this remind you of a niche in a cathedral? This was, of course, the path, essentially of an old arroyo, right? So, kind of makes sense that there's a little water flowing here. Lila: A little more polluted, this water, than that. Nathan: There's another one of these niches. This one has a light in it. Lila: Whoa! Nathan: Well, there you go. Lila: Oh, wow. Daveed: And an outlet. Lila: You need lighting for any statues that you might put in there. Daveed: You gotta bring an extension cord. Nathan: This is an old electrical box, I think. Daveed: Oh, wow. Lila: This is more gravelly here. Nathan: Thank you. Ha ha! Victoria: I know. I'm gonna lose my shoe. Daveed: Don't lose your shoe. Victoria: Thank you. Nathan: Wow. So, this dead-ends at the Bonaventure, right? Daveed: Yeah, it's just like a wood wall at the end and you can hear the freeway through it. Nathan: It's a shame that you can't walk through the whole-- I mean, I like the Bonaventure, but... Daveed: If it went to the subway terminal building, wouldn't that be so cool? Nathan: They could actually use this for transit if they hadn't built the foundation through it. Daveed: Yeah. We run the train back on Glendale Boulevard all the way to Griffith Park, right, or all the way to Glendale. Lila: So, do you have any of your magical, like, history? Daveed: Oh, yeah. Lila: Usually, you bring something. Victoria: I do. I did. Find my glasses. Daveed: I want to check it out. Nathan: Here. I got a flashlight here. Victoria: So, I brought the cover of "Pacific Electric" magazine, 1925, when the magazine opened. And so, it talks about how the "hearty approval of patrons usher in subway." Daveed: "Throngs attend opening." Victoria: "The band played; speakers spoke; banqueters dined; Klieg lights beamed; cameras clicked and ginger ale gingerly splashed against Car No. 741." Because it was Prohibition, so. Daveed: Oh, they sprinkled ginger ale on it? [Nathan laughs] So sticky. Victoria: And then, you know, here's, like, the pictures of the opening, in which Glendale and Burbank visitors who recited verses and sang catchy booster songs. Yeah, they did a whole little history tableau. So, we saw the history of streetcars as of 1925. So, we had the horse-drawn carriage. Then the kind of old-timey one. See? And then here. Here's the workers who are building this tunnel. I mean, their names are not here, but I feel like we should acknowledge this work that they did. Nathan: And this is all, like, they're just offloading... Daveed: Railcars. P.E. car... Victoria: 2415. Nathan: So, that's, like, a work car, a P.E. work car. Victoria: Yeah. Daveed: Wow, there's switches in the tunnel. That's on the other end. That's like the Pacific-- the subway terminal. 'Cause it has all those crazy switches. Nathan: So, here it was probably two tracks, right? Are we thinking? Daveed: Couldn't fit much more, right? Nathan: Yeah. Lila: I mean, I guess it's wide enough for two. One going one way, one going the other. Nathan: I wonder what happened to all the rails. There's--it's not beneath this mud, right? Victoria: Well, would they have taken it to melt it down for the metal? Lila: Like, they're not gonna leave that metal here. Daveed: It feels like it's gone. Unless the mud--the mud--'cause they didn't used to have that drainage control, so, water did flood in. Nathan: It could be 3 feet beneath us here. Daveed: It could be. Perfectly preserved. Nathan: Did you bring your shovel? [Laughter] Nathan: Exploring the tunnel was one thing. But I still wanted to see an actual red car rolling down the track. To do that, I had to take a more modern train to the Southern California Railway Museum. The museum got its start with just a handful of cars laid out on a small patch of Griffith Park. When the Ventura Freeway came along, the museum had to move, eventually settling here, an old right-of-way in Perris, in Riverside County, about 70 miles east of L.A. I met up with co-founder Harvey Laner. Harvey: Welcome aboard. Nathan: Thank you. [Chuckles] Oh, it's a nice breeze. You get much traffic at the crossing? Harvey: Not too much. Nathan: So, this car was the inspiration for the streetcar in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"? Harvey: It was. This car is what was generally called the Hollywood type car... Nathan: Uh-huh. Harvey: and so, it's kind of symbolic of the old Pacific Electric red cars. There was over 150 of this model car and they were called generically the Hollywood car, but they were used on lines other than Hollywood Boulevard. But it became the public representative of the red cars. This--this car. Nathan: And when did this car go out of service? Harvey: This car went out of service in--probably operated on the Watts Local line toward the end, so, it'd be roughly 1959. Nathan: So, I noticed on your hat is a little thing that says "Motorman." Harvey: Yes. See, I'm controlling the motors with this controller, and therefore, I'm the motorman. Nathan: So, what's the difference between a motorman and a conductor? Harvey: Well, the motorman operates the car, and back in the day, there was a second crew person, and that person collected the fares and stood at the rear door so people could get on and off the car back there, and that person was called the conductor. Nathan: So, how much training does somebody need to drive one of these things? Harvey: Well, when the cars were in regular service, it probably took a month of supervised operation. They had training cars, cars that would go out without any passengers on it, and they had a supervisor on board who would oversee the trainee's operating skill and assess it, and then make a determination as to how soon they could graduate to actually be in service with the public. Nathan: OK. What about for just one time around this loop? Harvey: You want to take it for a ride? Nathan: Are you kidding me? Yeah, that'd be a dream come true. [Bell rings] Harvey: All right, Nathan, you're the man here. Nathan: You're gonna have to tell me what to do. Harvey: If I let go of this, the brakes will come on. So, you gotta hold that down. You got it? Nathan: Yeah, I got it. Harvey: OK. And then this is the brake handle like I showed you. So, just take it over to the release position. Now, before you do that, we always have two rings on the bell. Step on that pedal on the floor. Nathan: This? [Bell rings twice] Harvey: There you go. So, you've let everybody around the car know that the car is gonna move, so, you can do what we call knock off the air. You can release the air brake. [Air brake hisses] Nathan: OK. Harvey: There you go. OK, keep that handle down and take one point with your left hand to you. One point. There-- Nathan: Whoa. [Laughs] OK. Harvey: Then you can shut off. Put it back where it was. That's right. And take this brake handle and move it to the center position there. That's good. Now release. There you go. Nathan: OK. [Laughs] It really does take a--take a while to get it...right? I mean, yeah, yeah. It's not like driving a car at all. Harvey: It's not like driving a car. [Nathan laughs] I want to take the curve nice and slow. [Laughter] Can I blow the whistle? Harvey: Yeah. Yeah. Matter of fact, we're coming up on the road crossing, and the road crossing, the standard signal is two longs, a short, and a long. Nathan: Two longs, a short, and a long. OK, here we go. [Blows horn] Harvey: You're a pro. Perfect. [Nathan laughs] Really fun. Harvey: You sure you haven't done this before? [Nathan laughs] Harvey: I think you're trying to take my job. [Nathan laughs] When Harvey was a teenager, he rode the rails just for fun and he brought his movie camera along. Thanks to Harvey, we have hours of footage of this lost railway. Eventually, Harvey and his friends turned their enthusiasm for trains into this amazing museum, where you can check out 35 different cars dating back to the 1920s. So, Harvey, you're into railcars, right? You're really into railcars. Harvey: I really am. [Laughs] Nathan: How did that come about? Harvey: Well, it all started when I was a very young kid and I would start doing my homework off the red cars. I joined a railroad club that had people my age that were also interested in the red cars and had the same passion, and so, we started taking pictures and trading pictures and just kind of came a part of it. The goal was to have a place where we could put up a pole and operate a streetcar without asking permission. So, here we are 60 some odd years later, and I can put up a pole, but I still have to get qualified, which is basically asking permission, so, nothing's changed. [Laughter] Nathan: You've really kept the memory of these red cars alive through the decades. And it's not just a museum that you've created, but you and your fellow fans, you've also created these massive archives, especially, like, photo archives and also films, that really keep the memory alive, too. Harvey: Yes. We have a very nice archives here. I get to look at every image that goes into it. Nathan: Wow. Harvey: That's a great vantage point. I have a front-row seat to it. Nathan: What do you call this car? Harvey: It's a Bernie safety car. Nathan: Safety car? Harvey: Safety car. Nathan: Whoa! How'd you do that? Just pull forward? Harvey: Yeah, that's it. They're called walkover seats. Nathan: Walkover seats. OK, so, you could--you could, I guess, change it for the direction you're traveling. Harvey: Exactly. Nathan: Fascinating. Harvey: Those were safety features back 100 years ago. Nathan: So, I want to hear the explanation for who killed the red car. You said that it's not--it's not what we think. You know, can you elaborate on that? Harvey: Yeah, sure. The problem is, is that the costs kept going up and the fare box could not cover those costs. And that is actually the way it is even today, because there are no privately owned public transit entities in the United States. They're all multi-county transit authorities. They're heavily subsidized, and that is the way public transit is. Once the Depression hit, it was--the costs were fixed and--and--and prohibitive. And when the war came along, there was a lot of ridership because you couldn't get tires and you couldn't get gasoline. But as soon as the war was over, the pre-war riding levels returned almost immediately. And then we went into the fifties and, of course, the roads were great. Superhighways and freeways were starting to be developed. Cars were available, mass-produced and more economical. And the red car type system was burdened with a shot infrastructure because the Long Beach line of the Pacific Electric goes back to 1902. And so, here you are in the end of the war and that--has had-- had not been rehabilitated. And there was also the fact that the streetcar and in urban lines only went to a certain point and the city started growing beyond those. And the red car couldn't finance building extensions to the railroad. Nathan: Right. So, if your house or your job is someplace not served by the red cars, then you're gonna drive. So, after World War II, the red car system is not profitable, essentially because it was never intended to be profitable. What happens next? How does the end come? Harvey: Well, the end came with the transit authorities taking over. For example, the end of the red cars came not under the Pacific Electric, not even under Metropolitan Coach Lines, but under the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority. Nathan: A public agency. Harvey: Exactly. And they made an attempt on the Long Beach line. They painted one of the blimps in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority green and white color scheme. And they even did a test run with a type of streetcar called a PCC. And it's a streamlined type of streetcar. And it just didn't work out. We rail fans had a tough time with a green red car, I'll tell you that. [Laughter] It was an incremental change that took place over a lot of years. Several decades. So, to go find one specific event that caused the red cars' demise, it's very hard to do because it's not really there. Nathan: That's a story that's not just specific to the red cars in Los Angeles, right? That's--that's something that happened in city after city all across the country. Harvey: It absolutely did. That's exactly right. Nathan: The story of rail in Los Angeles isn't over, not by a long shot. I went back to Union Station to meet up with Ethan Elkind, author of "The Definitive History of the L.A. Metro." Ethan: Oh, there's a train right there. Perfect. Pride of Tom Bradley right here. Nathan: Together, we rode to the location of the city's newest rail project, the Crenshaw line, connecting places like Leimert Park, Hyde Park, Inglewood, and ultimately LAX. So, this is gonna become a major transfer point, this--this Crenshaw line. Ethan: Absolutely. Yeah, to have a whole other line coming right in here is really gonna transform this area. This will be a real crossroads. Nathan: Right. So, the Crenshaw line here is pretty much like the first in the next generation of transit lines. Where do you see this all heading? Ethan: Well, with each rail line that comes into--into operation, it just exponentially boosts all the other ones, but I think the next stage for L.A. really shouldn't be about more rail lines. It ought to be about taking advantage of the rail lines that are already here and making sure that there are more apartment buildings built around the rail lines or jobs located there. Really just building up the communities around it because that's how we got the ridership and the real benefit out of the rail lines. Nathan: What does the arrival of--of rail to Crenshaw mean? Ethan: Well, I think for a lot of people in the community here, they wanted to be part of this investment in the rail system, but then there was also a lot of concern around gentrification. It's just gonna boot out renters, low-income renters who have lived here for a long time, and really change the character of the community. And so, there are some protections you put in place, but ultimately it's about sensitive design and how to introduce it kind of in a sensitive way into the community. But race has played a big part in the whole history of L.A., certainly, but also in metro rail. Tom Bradley: Today, we launch the beginning of the new blue line. Ethan: For example, one of the reasons why the first line was built, the blue line down to Long Beach, was because that's where the Watts Riots were in 1965, and one of the findings was that the people of color who lived in those communities there were essentially disconnected mobility-wise from where the jobs were in L.A., and so, the rail line was brought in as an effort to remedy racial injustice. But then in other examples like the Crenshaw stop, which is up on the purple line, there was a lot of objections from some of the wealthier, whiter residents to having a stop along Crenshaw, and the people in the Crenshaw quarter said, "Why are you leaving us out of this? We want a station there." Nathan: What specifically are they doing here to sort of mitigate those concerns about gentrification? Ethan: Well, they're doing a lot of outreach to the community. They're trying to work, first of all, with the businesses that are being disrupted. But otherwise, I think it's incumbent upon L.A. City Council to have strong policies around displacement, and we have some state laws as well that protect low-income renters against eviction in certain cases. Those laws aren't always followed, so, that's an area where we need to see more policy attention paid, because you don't want to see that happen with any kind of development. So, it's a sensitive balance, but it's one that it's really up to policymakers at the local and state level to try to figure out. Nathan: Yeah. So, you want to build but you want to build in a smart way. Ethan: Exactly. Nathan: Right, right. So, the system keeps expanding, and it's exciting to think about the future of rail in L.A. But, you know, there's nothing like taking a little ride into the past, and thanks to Harvey Laner and his friends, we can still do that. So, even while the shiny, new trains roll out, the red cars of old will roll on. This episode of "Lost LA" was made possible in part by a grant from Anne Ray Foundation, a Margaret A. Cargill philanthropy, and the Frieda Berlinski Foundation.
