Angels Flight
Angels Flight is a landmark and historic 2 ft 6 in (762 mm) narrow gauge funicular railway in the Bunker Hill district of Downtown Los Angeles, California. It has two funicular cars, named Olivet and Sinai, that run in opposite directions on a shared cable. The tracks cover a distance of 298 feet (91 m) over a vertical gain of 96 feet (29 m).[3]
For the funicular on Santa Catalina Island, see Island Mountain Railway. For the Michael Connelly novel, see Angels Flight (novel).Location
Hill Street, Los Angeles, California
1901
Merceau Bridge & Construction Co.; Train & Williams
4
October 13, 2000[2]
August 6, 1962[1]
The funicular has operated on two different sites, using the same cars and station elements. The original location, with trackage along the side of Third Street Tunnel and connecting Hill Street and Olive Street, operated from 1901 until 1969, when its site was cleared for redevelopment.
The current location opened half a block south of the original location in 1996, mid-block between 3rd and 4th Streets, with tracks connecting Hill Street and California Plaza.[3] It was shut down in 2001, following a fatal accident, and reopened in 2010.[4] It was closed again during June and July of 2011, and then again after a minor derailment incident in September of 2013. The investigation of this latter incident led to the discovery of potentially serious safety problems in both the design and the operation of the funicular.[5][6]
Before the 2013 service suspension, the cost of a one-way ride was 50 cents (25 cents for Metro pass holders). Although it was marketed primarily as a tourist novelty, it was frequently used by local workers to travel between the Downtown Historic Core and Bunker Hill. In 2015, the executive director of the nearby REDCAT arts center described the railroad as an important "economic link," and there was pressure for the city to fund and re-open the railroad.[3] After safety enhancements were completed, Angels Flight reopened for public service in August of 2017, charging $1 for a one-way ride (50 cents for TAP card users).[7][8]
History[edit]
Original location[edit]
Angels Flight funicular was built as the "Los Angeles Incline Railway" in 1901, with financing from J. W. Eddy. It began at the west corner of Hill Street at Third, and ran for two blocks uphill (northwestward) to its Olive Street terminus. The service consisted of two vermillion "boarding stations" and two cars, named Sinai and Olivet, alternately pulled up the steep incline by metal cables powered by engines at the upper Olive Street station. The downhill car descended by gravity alone.[9][10][11][12] An archway labeled "Angels Flight" greeted passengers on the Hill Street entrance, which became the official name of the railway in 1912 when the Funding Company of California purchased it from its founders.[13]
The original Angels Flight was a conventional funicular, with both cars connected to the same haulage cable and no track brakes in case of cable failure; a separate safety cable would be activated in a break. It operated for 68 years with a good safety record,[14] with three notable incidents: a 1913 a derailment (with a single female passenger); a sleeping salesman was dragged several yards by a car in 1937; and a sailor walking up the tracks was killed in 1943.[15][13]
A total of seven companies operated the railroad at its its original location. In 1912 Colonel Eddy sold it to the Funding Company of Los Angeles, which sold it to Continental Securities Company in 1914. Robert W. Moore, an engineer for Continental Securities, and the railway’s general manager since 1914, purchased the line in 1946. In 1952, Moore retired, and sold Angels Flight to Lester B. Moreland, an electrical engineer with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and Byron Linville, a prominent banker at Security First National Bank. Moore had gotten to know Moreland and Linville over his many years and believed the pair were earnest about preserving the history of the railway and capably maintaining its operation. The following year Moreland's family bought out Linville's interest and became sole stockholder.[16] In 1962 condemnation proceedings instigated by Los Angeles forced Moreland to sell to the city, whose redevelopment agency hired Oliver & Williams Elevator Company to run the line until it was shut down on May 18, 1969. Dismantling began the following day, and the cars were hauled off to a warehouse. The railroad's arch, station house, drinking fountain, and other artifacts were taken to an outdoor storage yard in Gardena, California.[17]
In November 1952, the Beverly Hills Parlor of the Native Daughters of the Golden West erected a plaque to commemorate fifty years of service by the railway. The plaque reads:[18]
In popular culture[edit]
Film, television, and video[edit]
Angels Flight has appeared in more than 100 films.[36] Angels Flight's earliest appearance on film is believed to be Their Ups and Downs (1914), starring Eddie Lyons, Victoria Forde, and Lee Moran. Other early appearances include: Good Night, Nurse! (1916), All Jazzed Up (1920), The Impatient Maiden (1932), The Unfaithful (1940), Hollow Triumph (1948), M (1951), The Turning Point (1952), Cry of the Hunted (1953), Bunker Hill: A Tale of Urban Renewal (1956), The Exiles (1961), The Money Trap (1965),[37] Angel's Flight (1965),[38] and They Came to Rob Las Vegas (1968). It appeared as a landmark rather than an active filming location in the Night Has a Thousand Eyes (1948), Criss Cross (1949),[37] The Glenn Miller Story (1954), Kiss Me Deadly (1955), Indestructible Man (1956), and The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies (1963).[37] Angels Flight Railway (1969)[39] and The Last Day of Angels Flight (1969) both center on the railway's closure in 1969.[37] After the railway reopened in 2010, Jason Segel performed "Man or Muppet" in The Muppets (2011). It closed again in 2013, but reopened for a single day to serve as a filming location for La La Land (2016), after which safety officials barred it from use as a filming location.[40][41] It was reopened for public use in 2017, and can be seen in The Saint.[42][43]
The railway is present in a 1953 episode of Boston Blackie, and in the only color episode[44] of the original Perry Mason, "The Case of the Twice-Told Twist" in 1966.[45][37] It also appears in the Amazon Studios show Bosch (2018), which is based on Michael Connelly's book Angels Flight.[46][36]
Other television show appearances include: in the 1969 episode "Narcotics DR-21" of Dragnet,[36] The Biggest Loser (2010),[36][47] The Bold and the Beautiful (2010), and in the Runaways episode "Old School" (2018). The original Angels Flight is featured in the Perry Mason remake (2020).[48][45]
Angels Flight appears as an interactive component of the video games Tony Hawk's American Wasteland (2005) and L.A. Noire (2011).[49]
Literature, visual arts, and music[edit]
The first book to be named Angel's Flight in reference to the railway was Don Ryan's 1927 novel. It is used by characters in Raymond Chandler's[50] The King in Yellow (1938) and The High Window (1942); in Michael Connelly's 1999 Angels Flight; and in Nick Carter's 1967 The Red Guard. The railway is illustrated and at the center of events in Piccolo's Prank by Leo Politi. Millard Sheets' 1931 oil painting Angel's Flight, which shows two young women on the looking down from the upper platform, is in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art's permanent collection.
David Woodard composed "An Elegy for Two Angels" (2001) in honor of Leon Praport, the sole person killed in the 2001 accident. Praport's wife, who survived the derailing, received an autographed score.[51][52] The furnicular is referenced in "L.A. (My Town)" by Four Tops (1970),[53] "Strange Season" by Michael Penn (1992), and "Aquatic Mouth Dance" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers (2022). The music video for "Icy" (2019) by ITZY contains dance scenes inside the Angels Flight. Michael Penn's album Free-for-All (2019) shows Angels Flight on the cover.