What's a "Street Trolley?"
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — The L.A. Times has a short piece on the Downtown streetcar effort running this morning on its L.A. Now blog. In a twist, though, it calls the proposed car a "street trolley."
I understand streetcar. I understand trolley. But "street trolley?"
Transportation planners are considering three different routes for a proposed street trolley that would run through downtown Los Angeles.
Los Angeles Street Car Inc. has been working with city officials and downtown property owners on the trolley concept, which is designed to connect the sprawling city center. It comes as officials are working on a plan to revive the movie palaces along Broadway, which is where the streetcar would run.
The Times also used the street trolley term in a January 2008 article on the Bringing Back Broadway effort, but it doesn't have any real history of doing so. A quick search of the Times' own archives reveals only 77 matches for "street trolley" (and many of those are in cases like "10th street trolley"). There are 9596 matches for "streetcar."
The trolley term (though certainly not this street trolley twist) was widely used early in the project's life, but advocates prefer the word streetcar to separate the operation of today's modern systems from the idea of a historic toy.
Tim on July 31, 2009, at 04:45PM – #1
I haven't heard the phrase "Street Trolley" in over 50 years. I remember being on the Culver City backlot, and hearing Judy Garland sing "Clang, Clang, Clang went the Street Trolley, Ding, Ding, Ding went the neat bell". Hearing the rhythm of the song completely butchered, Vincent Minnelli pulled her aside, gave her a shake, and say "Judy, enough with the drinking. What's next...Over the Sky Rainbow". At that point, she sobered up and sang the song correctly.
I guess the point of this trip down memory lane is that maybe the "Street Trolley" folks down at the Times need to sober up, too.
Alek F on August 03, 2009, at 08:43AM – #2
I think a Vintage trolley would be ideal for the Broadway corridor. It's an older-look streetcar, and - I think would be a perfect match for the classy and historical Broadway. Other routes could perhaps use a Modern streetcar (as the one used in Portland).
James Fujita on August 03, 2009, at 10:35AM – #3
in general, I suspect a lot of Americans - even transit fans - may have trouble distinguishing between the sort of "never modernized" streetcar that they have in New Orleans, the new "vintage" and "heritage" streetcar lines such as the one in San Pedro or in San Francisco, the modern light rail line and the modern streetcar such as the one in Portland.
In the Los Angeles Times' defense, they are trying to distinguish between the Broadway streetcar and light rail and I suspect that "street trolley" is a clumsy way of doing that.
Sandie Richards on August 04, 2009, at 11:58AM – #4
Could it be that a 'Street Trolly' has rubber tires rather than an electric connection? Just guessing.
Eric Richardson (@blogdowntown) on August 04, 2009, at 12:05PM – #5
That's certainly not what is being proposed, though that would be a reasonable guess.
Alex Brideau III on August 08, 2009, at 08:36PM – #6
Could the "street trolley" terminology be specific to one of the reporters at the Times? Maybe it's just a term that person uses, irrespective of industry-standard terminology.