Streetcars: February 2008 Archives
Canal Street before streetcars! This is an illustration from an 1857 magazine, before the New Orleans City Railroad Company constructed their streetcar line along Canal from White St. to St. Charles Ave.
The original plan was indeed to construct a navigation canal down the middle of Canal St., which is why it is so wide. Had that plan been followed, Canal would look more like Ponchartrain and West End Blvds. looked before the New Basin Canal was filled in. Canal construction was more difficult than the original planners realized, so it was decided to build a canal that extended Bayou St. John to downtown rather than build a full river-to-lake canal. With the Carondelet Canal following a back-of-town route, Canal St. was poised to become the city's main boulevard.
This illustration shows the wide "neutral" ground between the Vieux Carre on the right and Faubourg Ste. Marie on the left. Since the Creoles and the Americans both needed a shopping district, the central location of Canal St. made it perfect for this role. The buildings along Canal at this time are no more than three or four stories high at this time. The church in the background is the original Christ Church. The Episcopal congregation was located on Canal until Isadore Newman bought the corner of Canal and Dauphine from them in 1883 and built his first Maison Blanche store.
Public transportation along Canal at this time was provided by "omnibus" carriages. These carriages were horse- and mule-powered.
Von Dullen streetcar 2020 at Carrollton Shops. The work the craftsmen of Carrollton are doing to get the Von Dullens and the 400s back on the lines is incredible. Here, 2020's body is on the lift so the undercarriage can be inspected. The trucks are still the ones damaged by the Federal Flood. Those will be replaced by new trucks and a new propulsion system from Brookville Mining Corporation.
The "red ladies" that were damaged in the storm are all up at Carrollton (except for 2013, which is at BMC). They've been cleaned out, the bodies are being stripped and sanded all the way down to the bare metal. They are then run through the paint shop, for new primer and exterior coats. 2020 has completed this process, all the way down to the lettering, striping, and detail work. As soon as the new propulsion systems are fabricated and shipped down, the Von Dullens will be back at work on Canal St. and N. Carrollton Avenue.
Carrollton Station, located on Willow Street (the rear is on Jeanette Street) just off of S. Carrollton Avenue, is the home base of the Rail Department. The 2000-series Von Dullens as well as the 400-series Riverfront streetcars were fabricated here. The craftsmen who work here are some of the world's best experts on both "conventional" streetcars as well as LRVs (Light Rail Vehicles). They're good at both the old and the new because they maintain the fleet of 35 900-series streetcars from 1923 as well as the newer red ones. The 2000-series Von Dullens may look like "conventional" streetcars, but they have modern trucks, propulsion, and electronics, just like the slick LRVs you see in cities like San Diego and Baltimore. We just like our streetcars to have that classic, arch roof look that everyone associates with New Orleans.
PGT Beauregard was alive and well when this photo was shot, which is one of the reasons you don't see his statue on the City Park side of Bayou St. John. The bayou was still a navigable waterway at this time, a "back door" to the city. Fishing boats and others would come in from the Gulf of Mexico, into Lake Borgne, then Lake Pontchartrain, finally coming down Bayou St. John. That's why the bridge at the end of Esplanade Avenue was a drawbridge. Shrimp boats and oyster luggers would go out from the old turning basin near Congo Square, up the bayou to the lake, and return with their catches.
At this time, the New Orleans City RR Co. ran streetcar lines up to either side of the bridge. On the west bank of the Bayou (left in the photo), the Bayou Bridge & City Park line operated from the Half Way House to the bridge. On the eastern side, the Esplanade line ran the length of that beautiful street, turning into barn, looping around the block, along the bayou on Moss St., then re-joining the Esplanade tracks for the inbound run. The NOCRR had just begun streetcar operations four years earlier, in 1861. Even though the Civil War was raging in other parts of the country, New Orleans was an important port, and opportunities abounded for entrepeneurs. Because the city did not oppose the Union occupation after the naval battles were lost by the Confederacy, New Orleans was spared the fate of many other southern cities. Commerce and development continued throughout the war, in spite of the harsh rule of Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler, USA, whom the locals called "Beast."
This area was referred to as the "back of town" in those days. As the neighborhoods of Mid City and Faubourg St. John spread out this point at City Park, the term "back of town" came to refer more to the neighborhoods around S. Carrollton and Tulane Avenues.
