Where did the Streetcars/Trolleys of Pacific Electric and Los Angeles Railway Go?
As the last “Red Cars” and “Yellow Cars” were retired, as a result of conversion of their lines’ operation to buses, most of these rail cars were cut up for scrap. The principal scrap value seemed to be in trucks and motors (the latter contained much copper) whereas the bodies were a drag on the scrap yard as it was likely that they wouldn’t result in a profit after the cost of cutting them up (since they often contained wood and other materials that could not be salvaged) Due to strict air-pollution regulations they could not be burned in the open, a traditional reduction method. Not all the streetcars were scrapped, however. For reasons of economic value or historical worth, some escaped the scrapper’s torch. Many samples of types of rail cars that ran on the Pacific Electric (Red Car) and Los Angeles Railway (Yellow Car) systems still exist today at museums. When the Echo Park Avenue line of Pacific Electric was converted to bus in 1950 the 15 100-class cars (which were only 20 year
