CERA's 4th Friday, May 23, 2025 In Person and Zoom: Harvey Laner: Los Angeles Transit Lines 1955 Abandonment

CERA 4th Friday In Person and Zoom Presentation

4th Friday, May 23, 2025 at 7:00 p.m. CT

Harvey Laner

  Los Angeles Transit Lines 1955 Abandonment

400 E. Randolph St., 7th Floor Hospitality Room

Chicago, IL

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84039965430?pwd=NjVaWU1iaGs2bXpXRVRVbzdpQ3Yydz09 

or

http://tinyurl.com/CERA4thFriday

Zoom meeting Number 840 3996 5430    Passcode  572661

By 1955 the high public transit patronage of War time was a distant

memory. Returning G.I.s were buying tract houses with low-cost

Government loans in far off corners of Los Angeles County well

beyond the end of existing streetcar lines. Gasoline was cheap and

the new automobiles of the 1950s were especially enticing. The draw

of living and raising a family where there were once only orange

groves contributed to the wholesale abandonment of Los Angeles

Transit Lines streetcar lines. May 22, 1955, saw the end of service

for Los Angeles Transit Line’s ‘F’, ‘5’, ‘7’, ‘8’, ‘9’ and the northeast

portion of the ‘W’ Line.

The dynamics that were in play by the time of the 1955

abandonments are explained with a flashback to the January 10 th ,

1945, City Lines takeover of the Los Angeles Railway and the

changes that quickly occurred under the new Los Angeles Transit

Lines management under the Fitzgerald brothers.

This program describes the F, 5, 7, 8 and 9 Lines and the northeast

portion of the ‘W’ Line in detail through descriptive maps and the

cameras of railfans and LATL motormen, Alan Styffe and Andy

Payne. Scenes from Lloyd and Ross Selkeld, Gordon Zahorik and

others are included as well.

No PCC lines were affected. By 1955, all the LATL non-PCC cars

rostered were type H4’s and type K4’s. Each type is explained in

detail including the modifications they received through their years of

service. Also covered are LA Railway’s experimental oddballs, Type

L car 2501 and the two Type M cars, 2601 and 2602 that made it into

the LATL period.

The program concludes with an overview of the preservation efforts

of the Southern California Division of the Electric Railroaders

Association that took place in the 1950s. That successful effort

saved several LATL streetcars and work cars that are now at the

Southern California Railway Museum in Perris, California.

This program will also be presented on Zoom (CERA members only) for those members unable to attend the meeting in person.

If you have not yet paid your 2025 CERA Membership dues please do soon or contact me

for more information: Elmer Haneberg

elmer@corpevent.com

(773) 972-0470