Presbyterian College > Academic Web Server > Jon Bell > Transit > (Cities | Types) > Cleveland > 2003 Heritage Trolley

Cleveland, Ohio:
2003 Waterfront Heritage Trolley

Description

On Saturday and Sunday, 26-27 July 2003, two 100-year-old interurban electric railway cars ran on Cleveland's Waterfront Line to stir interest in bringing them and the rest of the Trolleyville USA collection of streetcars and interurbans to Cleveland. Trolleyville USA (formally the Gerald E. Brookins Museum of Electric Railways) is an operating streetcar museum in Olmsted Falls (southwest of Cleveland) that must move soon because its land has been sold. Its owners and trustees are trying to keep the collection intact, by moving it to a new facility in Cleveland or at least somewhere in northeast Ohio.

The two cars that ran in this event both originally ran on the Chicago, Aurora & Elgin, which was abandoned in 1957. Car 303 was built in 1906 by the Niles Car Company in Niles, Ohio. Car 36 was built in 1903 by the John Stephenson Car Company of Elizabeth, New Jersey. Both cars have wooden bodies. They were to operate together as a train, shuttling between Tower City and South Harbor. However, car 36 had a breakdown on Saturday's second trip, so 303 carried on by itself and 36 was put on static display at the Tower City station.

Pictures

Saturday, 26 July

[picture] Trolley fans cheer the arrival of cars 303 and 36 on the pocket track at the Tower City station, at the end of the first trip.

[picture] Passengers board at Tower City for the second trip.

[picture] The interior of car 303, with its wood paneling, is more opulent than the normal Waterfront Line rolling stock.

[picture] All the passengers having gotten off at South Harbor, car 303 is about to lead the way onto the tail track. This about when car 36 broke down.

[picture] The train waits on the tail track at South Harbor while the organizers decide what to do about car 36. Car 36 is lettered Columbia Park & Southwestern, another name for the Trolleyville USA route in Olmsted Falls.

[picture] A Breda LRV pulls onto the tail track in front of the heritage train.

Sunday, 27 July

[picture] Car 36 was on static display on the pocket track at Tower City.

[picture] Volunteers who served as conductors and guides chat next to car 36 at Tower City.

[picture] Car 303 pauses at Settlers Landing, in a view from above with the river in the background.

[picture] Car 303 passes through the Flats East Bank station.

[picture] Car 303 approaches the North Coast station, with the Cleveland Browns stadium in the background.

[picture] Passengers board car 303 at South Harbor.

[picture] Inside car 303, some passengers had to stand.

[picture] Passengers get off car 303 at Tower City.

This page was last updated on 13 May 2005, and verified on 5 December 2007.

Presbyterian College > Academic Web Server > Jon Bell > Transit > (Cities | Types) > Cleveland > 2003 Heritage Trolley

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