After opening in 1901, the Angels Flight funicular was constant in the downtown Los Angeles cityscape until its original location at Third St connecting Hill and Olive closed in 1969. In this rather remarkable photo, we see it chugging up the incline like The Little Engine That Could as the surrounding buildings are being torn down in preparation of the redevelopment of Bunker Hill. (The relocated Angels Flight commenced operations in 1996, between 3rd and 4th Streets, connecting Hill and California Plaza.)
And here it is from a different angle:
What memories, we lived downtown on Rampart St. in the mid 40’s to early 50’s. The highlight of my day was when my father took me to Angles Flight to take a ride up and down Bunker Hills. We were in Los Angles probably around 2002 and Angles Flight was still there but was not running that day. Thanks for the memories!
Hey Paul, it wasn’t just that day. Angels Flight stopped running in 2001 following a fatal accident. It didn’t start up again until 2010.
I could spend hours talking about Bunker Hill where I lived in the 1940’s and 50’s and my beloved Angels Flight. I have seen this photo many times. I don’t know how many people viewing it realize it’s actually flipped. It’s still terrifically nostalgic.
Took Angles Flight many times in the late 40’s.
Oh, it’s flipped? I didn’t realize that, but if anybody would know, it’s you, Gordon!
Gordon – I flipped the photo back again so that people have an accurate view of this image.
The parking lot visible above the Angels Flight car is actually located on the northeast corner of 3rd and Hill, not the southeast corner as it appears to be in the photo.
I remember my dad driving us home from downtown and we could see some of the rundown shanty buildings off to the right of the freeway. This would have been the late 40’s early 50’s. My parents took me on Angel’s Flight as a child then I took it much later when working on Bunker Hill.
When City Hall was closed while being earthquake retrofitted in the 1990s. all of us City employees were moved to other temporary offices. My office was in the old Title Insurance Building at 4th and Spring, so once a week my boss and I would walk over to take Angels Flight up to the restaurants situated in and around the Wells Fargo building. I’m glad I had a chance to have some Angels Flight memories.
Anyone who wants to get a sense of what the original location looked like in living color should watch the opening scenes of HBO’s re-make of Perry Mason. It’s as close to being there as you can get nowadays.
Yes. I can attest to the fact that they did an amazingly authentic recreation of Angels Flight and old Bunker Hill for that show.
They absolutely did. Normally it isn’t my kind of show, but that scene at the start hooked me.
The amazing thing is that there still exists a photo of the house on the corner that predated the tunnel and funicular. Looked like a long walk up those stairs next to the house in the hard shoes of the Victorian days.
Link leads to Marty Quuas’ shot in 1964 (color looking up from bottom) as listed in Misc. images subsection: http://coastdaylight.com/trains.html
Hope I didn’t mis-spell his name, but it’s easily found near the top of the intro page.