News & Features | Fleet Lists | Photos | Events Diary | Tram of the Year | About the Site | Email

Home > Photos Index > Gallery 862

Gallery 862: Around the World in Trams Special - Angels Flight Railway, Los Angeles

The Angels Flight Railway in Los Angeles is another funicular in the United States of America but one with a very interesting history. It is also on the National Register of Historic Places. As with many funiculars it is operated using two cars - in this case named Olivet and Mt. Sinai - and runs for 298.6 feet. The route has also changed over the years.

Originally known as the Los Angeles Incline Railway opened for services on 31st December 1901 standing next to the Third Street Tunnel and connecting South Hill Street to South Olive Street. The line was renamed the Angels Flight Railway in 1912 after a change of ownership (the first of many new owners!) and continued to operate regularly until 1969. By this time the line was owned the City of Los Angeles and it was closed for what was expected to be a "few years" whilst an urban renewal project took place in the vicinity. The cars were removed and stored in a nearby Community Redevelopment Agency with the upper station and lower archway moved to open storage.

A "few years" ended up being several decades as it wasn't to be until 1991 that there started to be pressure to restore the line. Work began in 1995 and the newly relocated line - no longer next to the Third Street Tunnel - was available for service the following year. A new organisation - the Angels Flight Founcation - was set up to run the line and it opened on 24th February 1996. It used the original cars, upper station building and lower arch but a new haulage system, and this system had a flaw which was not to be discovered until later. The first series incident occured on 1st February 2001 when one of the cars - Mt Sinai - was approaching the upper station and lost contact with the haulage cable sliding back down colliding with the other car and tragically leaving one passenger dead and seven others injured. In an investigation it was found that the new haulage system was incorrectly designed and failed to meet funicular safety standards. It wasn't to be until 15th March 2010 that the line was reopened (after repairs to the cars and the installation of a new haulage system including a safety cable and track brakes on each car).

A further accident occured on 5th September 2013 when one of the cars derailed near the middle of the trestle stranding one passenger on a car heading down and five on the way up. It was found that the brake safety system had been bypassed with a wooden stick and that this had directly led to the derailment. The line was immediately shut down and would remain that way until the unlikely saviour of Hollywood film - La La Land!

Filmed during 2015 and 2016 one of the scenes was filmed on the railway and for this to happen it was put in operation for the occasion. This was an impetus to get the line back up and fully operational with some additional work to install a stairway to the north side of the line and walkways along the tracks. The line was able to reopen to the public on 19th September 2017 and it has remained operational since.

In this collection we start off taking a look at the line when mothballed at the various infrastructure and the stored cars before we head back in 2017 for photos of the line running again.

Photographer: Edward M. Koehler
Photographs taken on Wednesday 5th August 2015, Friday 22nd July 2016 & Tuesday 19th September 2017


Historic plaque

Ticket Details

Service suspension notice

Upper Station

Upper Station

Entrance Gate

Upper Station

Looking Down

Looking Down

Stored Cars

Looking Up

Lower Station

Ticket

Ticket

Ticket Office

Original hositing mechanism

Location

Upper Station

Olivet

Olivet

Cars passing

Cars passing

Cars passing

Olivet

Olivet

Mt. Sinai

Mt. Sinai

Olivet

Olivet

Olivet

Mt. Sinai interior

Mt. Sinai interior

Olivet name

Original site

Return to Photos Index

This page was last updated on Sunday 12th April 2020


British Trams Online is run by enthusiasts for enthusiasts. All information contained on these pages is correct to the best of knowledge but mistakes will inevitably occasionally appear and if this happens we will correct it as soon as possible. Opinions expressed on these pages are those of the writer(s) and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of British Trams Online or any organisations we are associated with. Cookies may be used on this website and if you continue reading the site without changing your settings we assume you are happy to receive these. If you have any comments, suggestions or corrections please email.