The California Street Cable Railroad (Cal Cable) was a long-serving cable car operator in San Francisco, founded by Leland Stanford. The company's first line opened on California Street in 1878 and is the oldest cable car line still in operation.
The company remained independent until 1951, outlasting all the other commercial streetcar and cable car operators in the city. The city purchased and reopened the lines in 1952; the current cable car system is a hybrid made up of the California Street line, and the Hyde Street section of Cal Cable's O'Farrell, Jones & Hyde line, together with other lines already in municipal ownership.
Famous quotes containing the words street, cable and/or railroad:
“The last time I saw Paris
Her heart was warm and gay,
I heard the laughter of her heart in every street café.”
—Oscar Hammerstein II (1895–1960)
“To be where little cable cars climb halfway to the stars.”
—Douglass Cross (b. 1920)
“I was the conductor of the Underground Railroad for eight years, and I can say what most conductors can’t say—I never ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger.”
—Harriet Tubman (1821–1913)