The F Market & Wharves line is one of several

light rail Light rail (or light rail transit, abbreviated to LRT) is a form of passenger urban rail transit that uses rolling stock derived from tram technology National Conference of the Transportation Research Board while also having some features from ...

lines in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. Unlike most other lines in the system, the F line runs as a

heritage streetcar Heritage streetcars or heritage trams are a part of the efforts to preserve rail transit heritage. In addition to preserving street-running rail vehicles, heritage streetcar operations can include upkeep of historic rail infrastructure. Working ...

service, almost exclusively using historic equipment from San Francisco's retired fleet and from cities around the world (although buses are added during peak commute hours). While the F line is operated by the

San Francisco Municipal Railway The San Francisco Municipal Railway (SF Muni or Muni ) is the primary public transit system within San Francisco, California. It operates a system of List of San Francisco Municipal Railway lines, bus routes (including Trolleybuses in San Franc ...

(Muni), its operation is supported by Market Street Railway, a nonprofit organization of

streetcar A tram (also known as a streetcar or trolley in Canada and the United States) is an urban rail transit in which vehicles, whether individual railcars or multiple-unit trains, run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some include s ...

enthusiasts which raises funds and helps to restore vintage streetcars. Introduced as the F Market in 1983, in the first San Francisco Historic Trolley Festival, the service originally operated between the

Castro District The Castro District, commonly referred to as the Castro, is a neighborhood in Eureka Valley in San Francisco. The Castro was one of the first gay neighborhoods in the United States. Having transformed from a working-class neighborhood throug ...

and the Transbay Terminal, continuing to do so after being launched as a full-time, year-round service in 1995. In March 2000, it was extended at its eastern end to the Embarcadero and northwards along that street to Fisherman's Wharf, and a short section of the route between Market Street and the Transbay Terminal was discontinued. Despite its heritage status, the F Market & Wharves line is an integral part of Muni's intermodal urban transport network, operating at frequent intervals for 20 hours a day, seven days a week. It carries local commuters and tourists alike, linking residential, business and leisure oriented areas of the city. Unlike the

San Francisco cable car system The San Francisco cable car system is the world's last manually operated Cable car (railway), cable car system and an icon of the city of San Francisco. The system forms part of the Intermodal passenger transport, intermodal urban transport net ...

, the cheaper standard Muni fare system applies.

History

Previous F-Line

Cable car operations along Market Street began in 1888. Service was electrified in 1906. In 1915, the

started the F-Stockton route, which ran from Laguna (later Scott) and Chestnut Streets in the

Marina A marina (from Spanish , Portuguese and Italian : "related to the sea") is a dock or basin with moorings and supplies for yachts and small boats. A marina differs from a port in that a marina does not handle large passenger ships or cargo ...

down Stockton Street to 4th and Market Streets near Union Square, later extended to the Southern Pacific Depot (currently the Caltrain Depot) in 1947. The streetcar line was discontinued in 1951 and was replaced by the

30 Stockton 30 Stockton is a trolleybus line operated by the San Francisco Municipal Railway. The line is notable for being the slowest trolleybus route in the city of San Francisco because it travels through the densely populated neighborhood of Chinatown, ...

trolleybus route, which still runs today. The F-line designation was therefore available for use by the current line, although that service is over a completely different route from the F-line of 1915 to 1951.

Previous lines on Market Street

Market Street is a major transit artery for the city of San Francisco, and has carried in turn horse-drawn streetcars, cable cars and electric

streetcars A tram (also known as a streetcar or trolley in Canada and the United States) is an urban rail transit in which Rolling stock, vehicles, whether individual railcars or multiple-unit trains, run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some ...

. In the 1960s construction began on the Market Street subway, which would carry

BART Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) is a rapid transit system serving the San Francisco Bay Area in California. BART serves List of Bay Area Rapid Transit stations, 50 stations along six routes and of track, including eBART, a spur line running t ...

's trains on its lower level. All streetcar lines currently operating in the subway previously ran on the surface of Market Street, and were eventually diverted into the upper level of the tunnel. This diversion, together with the provision of new

cars, resulted in today's Muni Metro system. The diversion of the Market Street streetcar lines into tunnel and the replacement of the existing streetcars with new light rail cars was completed by November 1982. However, the street trackage on Market Street was retained, and many of the old streetcars were still in storage.

Historic trolley festivals

1983 SF Historic Trolley Festival - Porto car 122 on Market St at First

In 1982, San Francisco's cable car lines were shut down for almost two years to allow for a major rebuild. Temporary weekend historic streetcar service started on July3, 1982 as part of 4th of July celebrations and ran until September of that year. To provide a more regular alternative tourist attraction during this period, the San Francisco Historic Trolley Festivals began in 1983. These summertime operations of vintage streetcars on Market Street were a joint project of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and Muni. The trolley festival route went from the Transbay Terminal at First and Mission Streets to Market, then up the retained Market Street tracks to Duboce Avenue. From there, it followed a 'temporary' streetcar detour built in the 1970s to bypass subway construction under Market: Duboce, Church Street, and 17th Street to Castro.

F-Market Line

The Trolley Festival proved so successful it was repeated every year until 1987. In that year, preparation began for the introduction of a permanent F line. After that year's festival finished, Muni replaced the old Market Street tracks with new ones, restoring tracks to upper Market Street and recreating a line to Castro. Different types of vintage streetcars were evaluated to provide the backbone of the F-line fleet, resulting in the decision to use the PCC car, due in part to its historic San Francisco transit use. Fourteen such cars were acquired second-hand from

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

to add to three of Muni's own retired double-ended PCCs. On September1, 1995, the F line openedEhrlich, Peter. "PCCs by the Bay". '' Passenger Train Journal'', June 1996 issue, pp. 24–31. Pentrex. with a parade of PCC cars, painted to represent some of the two dozen North American cities that this type of streetcar once served. Ridership exceeded expectations and the ''8-Market''

trolleybus A trolleybus (also known as trolley bus, trolley coach, trackless trolley, trackless tramin the 1910s and 1920sJoyce, J.; King, J. S.; and Newman, A. G. (1986). ''British Trolleybus Systems'', pp. 9, 12. London: Ian Allan Publishing. .or troll ...

route that it had mostly replaced was completely discontinued on December29, 1995. At that point in history, this was a rare instance in which a streetcar replaced a bus line in operation, rather than the other way around. The need for extra cars resulted in the acquisition of ten Peter Witt-style cars then just being retired in the city of

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

, Italy. These cars were built in the 1920s to a design once common in North American cities, and their sister cars are still widely used on the Milan tramway network.

Extension on the Embarcadero

The Embarcadero is the eastern waterfront roadway of San Francisco, along

San Francisco Bay San Francisco Bay (Chochenyo language, Chochenyo: 'ommu) is a large tidal estuary in the United States, U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the cities of San Francisco, California, San ...

. At one time busy with port and ferry related traffic, it fell into decline as freight transferred to the

container terminal A container port, container terminal, or intermodal terminal is a facility where cargo containers are transshipped between different transport vehicles, for onward transportation. The transshipment may be between container ships and land v ...

s of

Oakland Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major West Coast port, Oakland is ...

and the Bay Bridge replaced the ferries. In the 1960s the elevated Embarcadero Freeway was built above, dividing the city from the bay, but was condemned and demolished after the

1989 Loma Prieta earthquake On October 17, 1989, at 5:04 p.m. Pacific Time Zone, PST, the Loma Prieta earthquake occurred at the Central Coast (California), Central Coast of California. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park in Santa Cruz Cou ...

. Proposals for streetcar service along The Embarcadero were put forward as early as 1974, and historic streetcar service along The Embarcadero was first provided during the 1987 Trolley Festival, using existing Belt Railroad tracks on The Embarcadero and towed diesel generators to provide power. With the freeway demolished, the waterfront started to be redeveloped for leisure and tourist activities, similar to Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39 at the northern end of the waterfront. To support this redevelopment, it was decided to rebuild the Embarcadero as a tree-lined

boulevard A boulevard is a type of broad avenue planted with rows of trees, or in parts of North America, any urban highway or wide road in a commercial district. In Europe, boulevards were originally circumferential roads following the line of former ...

with streetcar tracks in the median. The section north of Market Street was to be served by an extension of the F line. Tracks were extended on the northern end of Market to connect with the Embarcadero tracks. On March4, 2000, service on the F line began operating along the new extension to Fisherman's Wharf, replacing bus route 32. Service on the short section of the F line between Market Street and the Transbay Terminal was discontinued at that time. The last F-line trip departed from the Transbay Terminal at 12:55a.m. on the night of March3, and the track was abandoned in August 2000, the final use being a "farewell" trip by 1916-built work car C1 on August18, with track removal beginning soon afterwards. A month after the opening of the extension, Muni dedicated a car to

Herb Caen Herbert Eugene Caen (; April 3, 1916 February 1, 1997) was a San Francisco humorist and journalist whose daily columnist, column of local goings-on and insider gossip, social and political happenings, and offbeat puns and anecdotes—"A continuo ...

, the noted columnist for the

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

perhaps most famous for coining the phrase ''Baghdad by the Bay'' to describe The City. The car, Streetcar No.130, which was originally delivered in 1914, contains wood paneling and is decorated with many quotes from Caen. Service was suspended in March 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. It resumed on May15, 2021, with limited hours; full hours resumed on June26. Additional weekend afternoon short turn service between Fisherman's Wharf and the Ferry Building, operated by buses rather than streetcars, was added effective June10, 2023.

Better Market Street

The Better Market Street project, a streetscape project launched in the late 2000s to improve Market Street, has a transit component that aims to improve the operations of the F Line. The project would consolidate and eliminate some stops on Market Street and would also construct a new turn-around loop for the F Line at McAllister and 7th Streets. The loop would allow increased service between Fisherman's Wharf and the Civic Center area, which is the section of the line with the highest ridership. Average headways under the service improvement would be 5 minutes instead of the current 7.5-minute scheduled headways. In 2022, the city was forced to return a $15-million federal grant when it was revealed that they did not expect any construction of the loop to begin before the federally-mandated deadline of September 2025. Construction was shelved indefinitely.

Proposed extension

Muni completed a technical feasibility study to extend the F-Line from the vicinity of the existing Jones Street terminal with the assistance of the National Park Service in December 2004. The extended line would extend westward alongside the San Francisco Maritime Museum and Aquatic Park and then through the historic (1914) but disused single-track Fort Mason Tunnel, formerly owned by the State Belt Railroad. An Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the extension, again led by the National Park Service, commenced in May 2006, resulting in: * a draft conceptual engineering report, issued in January 2009 * a proposed transit operations plan, issued in July 2009 * a draft EIS, issued in March 2011 * the Final EIS, issued in February 2012 The final document classified areas west of the Fort Mason Tunnel as having "inadequate regional transit access...limited transportation options for transit-dependent residents... ndinfrastructure constraints impacting effectiveness and operations of Fort Mason Center." The Final EIS named a double-tracked extension along Beach Street, a jog north to Aquatic Park, then across Van Ness Avenue to single-tracked service through a retrofitted Fort Mason Tunnel and to a terminus in the Fort Mason Center parking lot as the "preferred alternative".

Car fleet

Muni owns a large selection of equipment for use on the F line, although not all of them are in service at the same time. The car fleet includes four sub-fleets:

PCC streetcar The Presidents' Conference Committee (PCC) is a streetcar (tram) design that was first built in the United States in the 1930s. The design proved successful domestically, and after World War II it was licensed for use elsewhere in the world where ...

s, Peter Witt streetcars, pre-PCC veteran streetcars from San Francisco, and a diverse collection of 10 streetcars and trams from various overseas operators. The line is principally operated by a mixture of the PCC and Peter Witt cars, although other more unusual or historic cars are often in service (including the 913 and 952, iconic streetcars named

Desire Desires are states of mind that are expressed by terms like "wanting", "wishing", "longing" or "craving". A great variety of features is commonly associated with desires. They are seen as propositional attitudes towards conceivable states of affa ...

since they are from New Orleans). The modern LRVs used by Muni Metro cannot be used on F Market & Wharves tracks because the overhead line is not compatible with

pantograph A pantograph (, from their original use for copying writing) is a Linkage (mechanical), mechanical linkage connected in a manner based on parallelograms so that the movement of one pen, in tracing an image, produces identical movements in a se ...

operation (though the older streetcars can operate on most surface sections of the Muni Metro system).

PCC fleet

A fleet of

s from San Francisco,

, and Newark, built between 1946 and 1948, operate on the line. , MUNI was operating 27 of these cars, restored to various states of service. Among the restored cars in service, three are original San Francisco double-ended PCC cars. Another 16 cars are single-ended cars acquired from

SEPTA SEPTA, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, is a regional public transportation authority that operates bus, rapid transit, commuter rail, light rail, and electric trolleybus services for nearly four million people througho ...

in 1992 (which continues to operate another 18 cars today, retrofitted for ADA compliance), while the remaining 11 cars are single-ended cars acquired from

New Jersey Transit New Jersey Transit Corporation, branded as NJ Transit or NJTransit and often shortened to NJT, is a state-owned public transportation system that serves the U.S. state of New Jersey and portions of the states of New York and Pennsylvania. It ...

in Newark in 2002 (built originally for Minneapolis-St. Paul and acquired from that system in 1953). MUNI has another 30 unrestored PCC cars in long-term storage. The unrestored cars include five additional San Francisco double-ended cars, 10 San Francisco single-ended cars, 12 single-ended cars acquired from St. Louis in 1957, two single-ended cars from Philadelphia, and two single-ended cars from

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

. A further previously restored car from Philadelphia was written off after a traffic accident in 2003. Many of the restored cars are painted in the color schemes of prominent past and present PCC streetcar operators, including Muni itself and other transit systems.

Peter Witt fleet

AFreshlyPaintedMilanPeterWittTramInTwoToneGreenOnItsThirdWeekOfServiceOnTheFLine

Muni operates a fleet of Peter Witt streetcars on the line, acquired from

, Italy. There are 11 of these cars, all built in 1928 to an Italian derivative of a common streetcar design that operated in many US cities, although never previously in San Francisco. Most of San Francisco's Peter Witt cars are currently painted in the overall orange color scheme that they carried in Milan, although one has been repainted into its original livery of yellow and white with black trim, while another is in the two-tone green livery that the cars carried from the 1930s to the 1970s.

San Francisco vintage fleet

The F-Line fleet also includes a fleet of pre-PCC vintage cars built between 1895 and 1924 for use in San Francisco. Three passenger cars were built for Muni itself, and a further two for the independent Market Street Railway Company that ran competing streetcar services in San Francisco until acquired by Muni in 1944. The final car is a works flat car, built for Muni in 1916 and used for hauling rails, ties, and other materials needed to maintain a streetcar system. The cars carry a variety of former San Francisco streetcar color schemes.

Worldwide fleet

The Muni's international fleet on the F-Line includes a diverse collection of 10 cars from various operators worldwide: * Blackpool tramway, in

Blackpool Blackpool is a seaside town in Lancashire, England. It is located on the Irish Sea coast of the Fylde peninsula, approximately north of Liverpool and west of Preston, Lancashire, Preston. It is the main settlement in the Borough of Blackpool ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

(including two distinctive open-air boat cars) * The former Hamburg tram system, in

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

* Hankai Tramway, in

Osaka is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the List of cities in Japan, third-most populous city in J ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

Kobe Municipal Transportation Bureau is an agency of the city government of Kobe, Japan that operates municipal Rapid transit, subways and city buses. Previously, it also operated city trams. Subway *Kobe Municipal Subway **Seishin-Yamate Line **Kaigan Line **Hokushin Line Bus *K ...

& Hiroshima Electric Railway, in

Kobe Kobe ( ; , ), officially , is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. With a population of around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's List of Japanese cities by population, seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Port of Toky ...

Hiroshima is the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 1,199,391. The gross domestic product (GDP) in Greater Hiroshima, Hiroshima Urban Employment Area, was US$61.3 billion as of 2010. Kazumi Matsui has b ...

Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways Board The Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways Board (MMTB) was a government-owned authority that was responsible for the tram network in Melbourne, Australia between 1919 and 1983, when it was merged into the Metropolitan Transit Authority. It had be ...

, in

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

* Moscow tram system, in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

( system) * Porto tram system, in

Porto Porto (), also known in English language, English as Oporto, is the List of cities in Portugal, second largest city in Portugal, after Lisbon. It is the capital of the Porto District and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto c ...

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

* STIB/MIVB, in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

. All the cars carry the color schemes of their original operators, except for the Brussels car, which currently carries a color scheme paying tribute to San Francisco's twin city of

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

(the streetcars actually in use in Zürich use meter-gauge and therefore cannot be moved to San Francisco). The Moscow trams had to be equipped with

trucks A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport freight, carry specialized payloads, or perform other utilitarian work. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, but the vast majority feature body-on-frame construction ...

Stop listing

References

External links

Market Street Railway websiteF Market Route Map with live updates on streetcar locations
{{DEFAULTSORT:F Market and Wharves San Francisco Municipal Railway Market Street (San Francisco) Streetcars in California Heritage streetcar systems Heritage railroads in California Castro District, San Francisco Financial District, San Francisco Tourist attractions in San Francisco 600 V DC railway electrification Railway services introduced in 1995