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February 27, 2007

Feature Photo: Canal Street, 1905

A splendid Alexander Allison photo of Canal Street, looking lakebound from Camp Street. The large building in the background is the original Maison Blanche building, constructed in 1898 and torn down in 1910, to make way for the existing MB building (now the Ritz Carlton Hotel).

There's a lot of streetcar activity here! The larger, double-truck streetcar in the foreground is a "Palace" car on the Canal line. The smaller, single-truck streetcars are a mix of Brills and Ford, Bacon & Davis, running on the various feeder lines coming to Canal Street. There were four tracks running down Canal from Rampart to the terminal trackage in front of the Custom House. Canal trackage was scaled back to two tracks in 1958, ripped up entirely in 1964, and returned to two tracks with the return of the Canal line. The terminal trackage running from the Custom House to the foot of Canal consists of the two tracks that turn onto the Riverfront line, plus a third, center track, for reversing the direction of streetcars during peak hours.

Posted by YatPundit at February 27, 2007 12:03 AM

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