Sun 14 May 2006

San Francisco wharf details

Posted by Daniel Swearingen under Modeling Ideas , Railroads , Waterfront
[3] comments / Leave a comment 

Waterfronts have always been interesting to me since they are often funky and usually have lots of history visible.

I live just across the bay from San Francisco and a couple weeks ago I took the ferry over to the waterfront and took some pictures.

The tracks on the San Francisco waterfront were operated by the State Belt Railroad and were standard gauge with a large portion dual-gauged with 3 foot trackage to handle narrow gauge cars ferried over from the south-east bay and north bay.

Here’s a nice bit of old pier left. There are railroad tracks on it as well. This is the remains of Pier 22-1/2. That little bridge in the background is the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge. A beautiful bridge in its own right but forever outshone by the nearby Golden Gate bridge.

If you have the free Google Earth application (HIGHLY recommended) you can go right to this location and follow along the next few photos by clicking on the location link here: San Francisco Fireboat 1 Phoenix

Close up showing the girder style (like street traction) track in the old pier.

This bit of pier is near the San Francisco Fire Department’s Fireboat Station No. 1 station which is itself built on a pier. The fireboat was away that morning.

Just south of the Bay Bridge is this tight little space between buildings with the track intact. This is the north side of Pier 26.

A little further south is Red’s Java House. When I first saw this building ten years ago it was very funky. Imagine it without the spiffy new paint.

 

3 Responses to “San Francisco wharf details”

  1. henry Says:
    May 15th, 2006 at 4:46 am

    Came to your site via your link at Darryls new Waterfrontmodeling site

    You’ve reminded me of the old 69th street ferry, the pier was located in BayRidge, Brooklyn N.Y.

    As a child each summer my parents would take us to the New Jersey shore. When we left to go to the country house, we would travel down to 69th st and generally wait on a line of cars which surrounded a park for about four hours, for the next available ferry to board and take us accross to St George, Staten Island.

    This was quite some time before the construction of the Varazanno Bridge which eliminated the ferry’s very existance from our section of brooklyn.

    While I was in the service, stationed in San Antonio, Texas. I realized that I would never ever settle down in a location totally surrounded by land (landlocked,as I called it).

    Discovered that I couldn’t and missed the smell the salt sea air.

    Settled in Clearwater, Fl.

    thanks for the posting and the pictures.

    henry

  2. Dave R Says:
    June 27th, 2006 at 8:02 pm

    I’m always interested in waterfront pics, I’ve been to Red’s there are some nice old B&W pics inside. It’s a shame that the fire boats were gone the day you were there. What kind of camera and lens do you use?
    seeya

  3. Dan Says:
    June 30th, 2006 at 1:54 pm

    Hi Dave,

    I use a Sony Mavica FD-97 which is old and low res (1.9 MPixel) by today’s standards but has good optics and is really good for publishing the photos on the web.