Ontario and San Antonio Heights Railroad Company is a former railway company which operated in Ontario, California. The company's service is noted for using a Gravity Mule Car from 1887 to 1895.
The mule-car served Ontario until 1895, when the line was electrified by new owners, Ontario Electric Company. [1] [2] [3] It was occasionally used afterwards, when the electric generator in the powerhouse was flooded. [4] The Ontario Electric Company was merged into the Pacific Light & Power Corporation in 1908, and the extension to Pomona commenced work in 1909, which opened New Year's Day 1911. [5] The railroad would go on to be acquired by the Pacific Electric on April 13, 1912. [3] [6]
Operated from 1887 to 1895, a car with a pull-out trailer was utilized for passenger service, allowing the mules to ride on the car body on the downhill segment. [6] Mules provided the propulsion for the uphill segment to Euclid Avenue, taking about 90 minutes. The downhill gravity-powered ride lasted only 30 minutes. [2]
The obituary for the mule Sanky on the front page of the Ontario Daily Report of February 6, 1914 was under the headline, “Mule, Figure in Early History of Ontario, is Dead.” It mentioned that in 1895, Sanky and his partner Moody were sold to farmer C.B. Adams in San Antonio Heights after the inauguration of the electric tram had made them obsolete. When hitched to a harrow for ranch work, they persistently refused to budge and coaxing and force were equally without effect. The farmer had to motivate them by attaching a bell from the old rail car to his harrow. With the familiar signal, the mules started valiantly up the orchard, but at the head of the orchard, Moody and Sanky persisted in attempting to climb onto the harrow for the downward journey, said the obituary. It took weeks before the pair could be trained to plow in both directions. [7]
The railroad operated along Euclid Avenue, connecting the Ontario Southern Pacific station in the south to the Upland Santa Fe station, Euclid Avenue stop of the Pacific Electric Upland–San Bernardino Line, and continuing north to San Antonio Heights. [3]
Starting with Pacific Electric's acquisition in 1912, the segment from Upland to Ontario was through-routed Pomona–Claremont–Upland Line, providing a one-seat (though indirect) ride between Ontario and Pomona. This line saw service until October 6, 1922. The Upland–San Antonio Heights segment was an independent streetcar service until about July 1924 when system-wide power issues forced bus substitution that was never reversed. [8]
Upland is a city in San Bernardino County, California, United States on the border with neighboring Los Angeles County. The municipality is located at an elevation of 1,242 feet (379 m). As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 79,040, up from 73,732 at the 2010 census.
Ontario is a city in southwestern San Bernardino County in the U.S. state of California, 35 miles (56 km) east of downtown Los Angeles and 23 miles (37 km) west of downtown San Bernardino, the county seat. Located in the western part of the Inland Empire metropolitan area, it lies just east of Los Angeles County and is part of the Greater Los Angeles Area. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 175,265.
The Pacific Electric Railway Company, nicknamed the Red Cars, was a privately owned mass transit system in Southern California consisting of electrically powered streetcars, interurban cars, and buses and was the largest electric railway system in the world in the 1920s. Organized around the city centers of Los Angeles and San Bernardino, it connected cities in Los Angeles County, Orange County, San Bernardino County and Riverside County.
The Pomona Valley is located in the Greater Los Angeles Area between the San Gabriel Valley and San Bernardino Valley in Southern California. The valley is approximately 30 miles (48 km) east of downtown Los Angeles.
A gravity railroad or gravity railway is a railroad on a slope that allows cars carrying minerals or passengers to coast down the slope by the force of gravity alone. The speed of the cars is controlled by a braking mechanism on one or more cars on the train. The cars are then hauled back up the slope using animal power, a locomotive or a stationary engine and a cable, a chain or one or more wide, flat iron bands. A much later example in California used 4 ft 8+1⁄2 instandard gauge steam engines to pull gravity cars back to the summit of Mt. Tamalpais.
State Route 83, also or primarily known as Euclid Avenue, is a state highway and city street in the U.S. state of California. Officially, SR 83 runs from the Chino Valley Freeway in Chino Hills north to the San Bernardino Freeway in Upland. Euclid Avenue then continues north through Upland to the unincorporated community of San Antonio Heights.
The Los Angeles Railway was a system of streetcars that operated in Central Los Angeles and surrounding neighborhoods between 1895 and 1963. The system provided frequent local services which complemented the Pacific Electric "Red Car" system's largely commuter-based interurban routes. The company carried many more passengers than the Red Cars, which served a larger and sparser area of Los Angeles.
The East Bay Electric Lines were a unit of the Southern Pacific Railroad that operated electric interurban-type trains in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Beginning in 1862, the SP and its predecessors operated local steam-drawn ferry-train passenger service in the East Bay on an expanding system of lines, but in 1902 the Key System started a competing system of electric lines and ferries. The SP then drew up plans to expand and electrify its system of lines and this new service began in 1911. The trains served the cities of Berkeley, Albany, Emeryville, Oakland, Alameda, and San Leandro transporting commuters to and from the large Oakland Pier and SP Alameda Pier. A fleet of ferry boats ran between these piers and the docks of the Ferry Building on the San Francisco Embarcadero.
The Sacramento Northern Railway was a 183-mile (295 km) electric interurban railway that connected Chico in northern California with Oakland via the state capital, Sacramento. In its operation it ran directly on the streets of Oakland, Sacramento, Yuba City, Chico, and Woodland. This involved multiple car trains making sharp turns at street corners and obeying traffic signals. Once in open country, SN's passenger trains ran at fairly fast speeds. With its shorter route and lower fares, the SN provided strong competition to the Southern Pacific and Western Pacific Railroad for passenger business and freight business between those two cities. North of Sacramento, both passenger and freight business was less due to the small town agricultural nature of the region and due to competition from the paralleling Southern Pacific Railroad.
The Peninsular Railway was an interurban electrified railway in the U.S. State of California in the United States of America. It served the area between San Jose, Los Gatos, and Palo Alto, comprising much of what is today known as "Silicon Valley". For much of its existence it was a subsidiary of the Southern Pacific Railroad.
Ontario station is an Amtrak train station in Ontario, California, located on the Union Pacific Railroad Alhambra Subdivision. It is served by the thrice-weekly Sunset Limited/Texas Eagle. The station has a covered, open-air pavilion built by the city in 1991.
South Pasadena Local was a local streetcar line operated by the Pacific Electric Railway between Downtown Los Angeles and South Pasadena, California by way of the Arroyo Seco Route. This was one of four lines that connected the two cities.
The Upland–San Bernardino Line was an interurban line operated by the Pacific Electric Railway between Downtown Los Angeles and San Bernardino, California. This line also had shorter service that terminated before the end of the line at Baldwin Park, Covina, and San Dimas. Though service along this line in its entirety was discontinued in November 1941, it stands as the fourth-longest rapid transit line in American history, after the Sacramento Northern Railway's Chico and Colusa services, and the Pacific Electric's own Riverside–Rialto Line.
The South Hollywood–Sherman Line was a suburban route of the Pacific Electric Railway. The line ran between Downtown Los Angeles and the suburb of Sherman. The line was named after Moses Sherman, who built the line and the Sherman street car yard on the line in West LA. The large 5.56-acre (2.25 ha) rail facility was on Santa Monica Boulevard just west of La Cienega Boulevard. The yard had a steam power house, a car barn and a shop building.
The Etiwanda Depot is a former railway station of the Pacific Electric Railway, located in Rancho Cucamonga, California. The station was principally in service for the Upland–San Bernardino Line.
The Riverside–Arlington Line is a former Pacific Electric interurban railway line in the Inland Empire. The route provided suburban service between San Bernardino and Arlington with a later extension to Corona. It operated between 1893 and 1943.
The Upland–Ontario Line is a former Pacific Electric streetcar line in San Bernardino County, California. Cars did not travel to Downtown Los Angeles and instead provided a local service between Ontario and Upland with through service to Pomona.
The Pomona–Claremont Line was a Pacific Electric streetcar line in Southern California. Unlike most of the company's services, cars did not travel to Downtown Los Angeles and instead provided a suburban service between Pomona, Claremont, and Upland.
Streetcars in Redlands transported people across the city and region from 1889 until 1936. The city's network of street railways peaked around 1908 before the patchwork of separate companies was consolidated under the Pacific Electric.