40th Street Cut 1954

Description:
Key System C train in the 40th Street Cut (looking west toward Broadway), Temescal district, Oakland, Calif. The cut extended from Broadway east to Howe Street, through which the Key System ran a streetcar to a station at Piedmont Avenue and 41st Street and on to Piedmont via Oakland Avenue. The 40th Street Cut was excavated in 1903, creating a single track streetcar right-of way. After the C line train service was discontinued, in 1957, the 40th Street cut was filled back in to create an extension of 40th Street that continued up and over the hill to Howe Street.

Date of Document:
Feb-54

Document Author:
Unknown

Geographic Location:
40th Street and Broadway, Oakland, Calif.

Context:
The Key System, a company providing streetcar and bus service in the East Bay cities of Alameda, Albany, Berkeley, El Cerrito, Emeryville, Oakland, Piedmont, Richmond, and San Leandro, as well as ferry service to San Francisco, operated from 1903 (when it consolidated several independent streetcar companies) until 1960. Bus service was introduced in 1921. With completion of the Bay Bridge in 1936, Key System trains began running (on the bridge s lower deck) between Oakland and the Transbay Terminal in San Francisco. Streetcars stopped operating in 1948. Commuter train service into San Francisco was discontinued in 1958. The company was sold in 1960 to the newly formed public agency, AC Transit.