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East Shore & Suburban Railway San Francisco Bay by Eric Hanson PRJ Soft Cover
East Shore & Suburban Railway San Francisco Bay Soft Cover by Eric Hanson Pacific Railway Journal Vol 2 #12 March 1961
For two generations the expansion and growth of America has been paced by that of the electric trolley car. Its coming in hundreds of areas changed rural hamlets into bustling cities almost overnight.
But nowhere was this accomplished more dramatically than in Richmond, California, at the turn of the century. As so often was the case in the early 1900's, the rails pre-dated the commuters. The service awaited their coining.
Doubtful visitors became eager home buyers and willing commuters from outlying districts when they discovered they could ride to and from work in dependable, low priced electric street cars.
Richmond boasted but 1000 souls on August 13, 1900, when two city councilmen, A. S. Macdonald and William G. Henshaw, were granted a franchise by the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors to construct a street railway system in and about the unincorporated towns of Old Town, Atchison, and East Yard, all in Point Richmond which had been selected earlier as its West Coast terminus by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway.
The franchise authorized a line starting at the Santa Fe depot in East Yard and extending north through flat, fertile country for a half mile, thence east one mile to the Southern Pacific Railroad depot.
It was a 50-year franchise.
Supervisors agreed with the two promoters on a price of 3100 cash, plus 2% of net receipts after the first five years of operation. Also, the promoters were to erect and maintain electric lights along the route, then without any night illumination whatsoever.
But numerous delays plagued the beginning of work. Because the streetcar line would have to cross its tracks twice, the Santa Fe representatives balked at giving permission. A bitter fight ensued.
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