Canal Line: December 2005 Archives

Jingle, Jangle Jingle,
Here comes Mr. Bingle...

Mr. Bingle is back on the Canal Line, well, sort of. The little snowman was the Christmas spokesman for the Maison Blanche department stores. For decades, moms would take their kids down to the Maison Blanche store on Canal and Dauphine Streets to see Mr. Bingle in the front window. In the late 1950s and early 60s, Mr. Bingle did TV commercials for the store on the before-school children's shows.

By the 1980s, Mr. Bingle was gone from both TV and the front window display on Canal Street. He was still the Christmas icon of the MB chain, and the store commissioned a giant Bingle that they hung on the front of the store. After Maison Blanche was acquired by Dillard's in the 1990s, that chain displayed the big Bingle on the side of their store at Lakeside Mall, but it just wasn't the same, and they eventually put the snowy guy into storage.

Dillard's brought the big Mr. Bingle out of storage last spring, this time to donate him to City Park. He was a bit worn out, but the park raised funds to restore him to make Mr. Bingle a part of the annual "Celebration in the Oaks" display. The storm wiped out a lot of the park's buildings, forcing the park to severely scale back the size of this year's display. "Celebration in the Oaks" usually has two components: one is a "driving tour" around the park where you drove around and viewed large light displays on the ground and in the trees. This component was cancelled this year because of the storm. The second segment, the "walking tour," went on as planned, with Mr. Bingle a part of it. The train garden is back operating as well, lit up for Christmas and sporting both classic green and 2000-series red model streetcars.

Mr. Bingle is a wonderful memory for many adults in the city, and an important symbol of our desire to bring our town back.

Jingle, Jangle Jingle
Here comes Mister Bingle
With another message from Kris Kringle.

As we launch this Christmas season,
Maison Blanche brings Christmas pleasin.
Gifts galore for you and me.
Each of them from...MB!

Obviously this is an old photo. Mr. Bingle done quit at the Carlton Ritz because he can't reach da buffet. :-)

We're going to City Park tonight. I know that Dillard's donated the big Bingle to the park, but I don't know if he's up for this year. We'll see!

Another postcard that's really too small of a scan to be a "feature photo." This is Canal Street around 1915. The photographer is standing on Canal, in between St. Charles and Carondelet. You can see the "new" MB building in the background.

The streetcars are "Palace" cars of the New Orleans City Railroad Company. At this time, the NOCRR ran the "Palace" cars and the New Orleans & Carrollton Railroad Company was beginning to try out a new semi-convertible from the St. Louis Car Company, designed by Mr. Perley A. Thomas.

Perley A. Thomas streetcar #930 at Canal and Liberty last week, in the first test run of a streetcar since the storm. Decorated for the holiday season, 930 was pulled by a pickup truck from Carrollton Station on the St. Charles tracks to Canal Street. There the streetcar was powered up and initially ran to the three-track terminal at the foot of Canal. Satisfied that the overhead was working properly, RTA allowed the streetcar to continue up Canal Street to Liberty Street, where it switched back to the inbound track.

The testing went so well that RTA approved limited operations of six Perley Thomas streetcars on a hybrid line consisting of the Riverfront trackage and a portion of the Canal line. Regular streetcar service returned to New Orleans this morning (18-December) at 7am, when 930 left the French Market terminal for Canal Street.

The 900s will run on the hybrid line at least through March of 2006 for free.

One of New Orleans' most important icons is back. Things are improving.

This is my first attempt at video with this little digital camera, so be gentle:

930 heading inbound towards the foot of canal

930 heading outbound from the foot of canal

Continuation of outbound run

RTA brought Perley Thomas streetcar #930 from Carrollton Station to Canal and St. Charles this morning to test the Canal trackage and wiring. I watched as they ran 930 from St. Charles to the foot of Canal, switched to the outbound track, then ran down to the crossover at Liberty. I had to get on with my day from there, but it appears that the test was a success, at least to that point.

930 waiting for the media event to be choreographed:

From the uptown side of the street:

more photos follow...