Results tagged “cablecar”

A cable car collided with a van near Washington Street near Mason Street last night, injuring four. According to SF Appeal, "The crash happened at about 5:15 p.m." And "two passengers were taken to local hospitals and two others were treated at the scene." Yikes. None of the injuries, thankfully, were life-threatening.

            

Yesterday morning, a new cable care for tourists was unleashed onto the streets of San Francisco. And yes, you will need sunglasses to enjoy these images of the shockingly colored car.

San Francisco is throwing around the idea of selling the naming rights of the cable cars to aid SFMTA. Naturally, people do not like the money-making scheme of re-naming the iconic cars -- cars that, over the last ten years, operate more for tourists' whimsy than any need to get to anywhere -- because it degrades the cable cars' lore. Or whatever. According to SF Examiner, Muni Director Malcolm A. Heinicke "envisions that groups could raise funds to name one of the 40 cable cars or the nearly 90 streetcars after a similarly iconic San Franciscan or local institution. The revenue from selling the naming rights could be used to fix and restore those vehicles." However, chances are that this idea will fail because whenever you try explaining to most San Franciscans that they do not, in fact, live in the merry ol' land of Oz, their heads explode.

Service was disrupted after a cable car rammed into a sports utility vehicle that was double parked. (Tsk, tsk.) The "accident," which happened yesterday afternoon a little before 5 p.m., occurred on Hyde Street between North Point and Beach streets. The SUV's driver and a cable car passenger were treated for a minor boo-boos. Otherwise, no one else was seriously injured.

While it seems too sugary to be true - and we doubt it is - this story has touched our cold, selfish hearts. See, Muni Diaries has a story of fate and romance that will have you believing in the magical powers of public transportation again.

A little before 6 a.m. this morning a cable car struck a pedestrian on Mason Street near Broadway. the unidentified person was sent to a local hospital. According to the Muni Spokesperson Judson True, the extent of the pedestrian's injuries are not known at this time. Service on the Powell-Mason line has since been restored. (CBS 5)

Two cable cars smacked into each other at California and Drumm streets. (Oops.) The accident happened around 8 a.m. this morning, injuring two crew members.(Cha-ching!) Sadly, due to the accident, all cable cars on the California line will be out of service today. (Wah wah.) (ABC 7)

Four people were hurt after a cable car derailed last night at Washington and Powell streets. (Check out this image of the car off its tracks. So wrong!) A little before midnight last night, a cable car jumped the tracks as it was turning onto Powell Street. Three passengers were sent to the hospital for minor injuries, and "one man appeared to have a broken leg." Egads. Anyway, the cause of the accident is still under investigation.

          

During yesterday's hotly contested Muni Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest, Leonard Oats beat frontrunners Ken Lunardi and Byron Cobb to snag the title of Best Bell Ringing MUNI Employee in the Universe. In the amature division, first place went to "Scottie B" of KOIT (we'd like to think Vanessa Williams played a small part in his victory); second place, Aaron Jones of KBLX, and third place went to Janelle Wang of ABC 7.

Here at SFist, we are not impressed with percussive instruments. Calling a drum circle "music" is like calling crosswalk stripes "a painting." But there's something sort of impressive about an experienced cable car bell-ringer, so gosh darn it we can't quite manage to fully roll our eyes at today's annual Muni Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest (noon in Union Square), at which Gavin Newsom and several local news personalities (please Jan Wahl, please Jan Wahl, please Jan Wahl) will judge clanking sounds and award prizes.

• No. 25 is alive. Again. [WhatImSeeing]
• "OMGROFL" [Jameth]
• Breaking news: Danielle Steel's "glazed" Stinson Beach home for sale. [Curbed]

Guess what we don't want to think about while riding San Francisco's whimsical, romantic, and downright gorgeous cable cars? Unkempt sphincters.

Did you ever wonder just where or how cable cars were made? More to the point, did you know that cable cars didn't just fall from the sky? Well, we didn't. WhatImSeeing, allowed inside the Woods Division's Cable Car carpentry shop in the Dogpatch nieghborhood, landed some spectacular shots of San Francisco cable cars in the process of being made.

Muni issued an alert yesterday afternoon that said simply, "Emergency - Powell line cable cars back in service." Oh no! Emergency! Cable cars unleashed on an unsuspecting public! Save yourselves! Run for the hills! Oh no wait -- the hills are exactly where the cable cars WANT you to run!

While crews repair a damaged cable, California Street cable cars will be down for the count today, but could return to service by early tomorrow. Sad, isn't it?

In North Beach fights breakout and mild vandalism occurs after bars close at 2 a.m. This chaos, typical for any city, makes some of our sensitive city dwellers cranky before bedtime. Or whatever. So, the City Planning Commissioners somehow got it into their heads that closing pizza parlors on the the Broadway strip, pizzerias that normally stay open until 3 a.m. or 4 a.m., before 2 a.m. will solve a slew of problems. According to the Examiner:

Black Friday, the Friday after Thanksgiving, the day where big retail shoppers traditionally break even for the year! Traditionally considered the biggest shopping day of the year! Is it retail therapy? ....Or is it kowtowing to the gods of capitalism and binding the workers who long to be free?

Screw the cardboard tube battle, this sounds like something that needs to happen every night. This evening at 5 p.m. sharp, head on down to the tourist epicenter of San Francisco, the Powell Cable Car turnaround, for what will be a massive pie fight. According to Mr. Scott Beale over at Laughing Squid, SF0 player Herbie Hatman is organizing a formal-attire pie fight (think Mabel Normand, Keystone Cops) which will get all up in...

Last night we had the opportunity to bear witness to a most common SF annoyance - cable car operators not collecting fares. Shocking? No. But, what did throw us for a loop was the brakeman, who accepted a tip.

We lost a geek last week, but we still had a local bachelorette to root for along with a "dream date" to our fair city on "The Bachelor"!

Photo of protest by Filipino-American's at the Disney Store.

The Powell-Hyde Street cable car line shut down for the rest of the day today. The cable running beneath the car was "frayed," it seems. Frayed? That...sounds scary. We wonder if any cars have plummeted down one of our lovely hills due to frayed cables snapping.

-- Cammerin Boyd killed by reasonable force, says jury. [Chron]

Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course.

We’re thrilled when our commute ends up boring rather than late or, say, riddled with crushed pedestrians and such. It turns out that this commute, well, it’s the stuff that dreams are made of: kids' fantasies. Apparently, CalTrain is so dreamy and hot that it's now a center spread in the newly released Timmy and Tammie’s Train of Thought. TTTT, for short.

Sigh. For those of us for whom a MUNI FastPass is not enough (i.e., with commutes outside the SF city limits), we really have been eagerly awaiting The One Card To Rule Them All Translink system, which promised to let you buy one magnetic card that would give you access to all Bay Area public transportation systems. No more fumbling around for BART tickets, or waiting in line by the cable car to buy MUNI passbooks, or frantically flipping around your credit card so the stripe faces the right way in the ticket-buying machine right as the Baby Bullet starts ominously clang-clang-clanging an imminent departure to the South Bay!

There's been ANOTHER shooting in broad daylight??? Police had to race to Market Street between 5th and 6th after a drive-by shooting this afternoon.

DROP EVERYTHING. Seriously, clear your calendar for this one: it's a good old fashioned bell-ringing contest! By gum, it's been a while! Well, a year. Oh, and it's happening today. You didn't have any plans, did you?

Send your Bay Area finds to found [at] sfist [dot] com or tag them sfist and found on Flickr! Let us know where and when you found the item and any other helpful info. Today's find is courtesy of Greg Dewar of the fabulous N Judah Chronicles, brought to us via the SFist Found Flickr stream. We love the colors and texture in this one. The sink looks like it belongs in some big,...