L Taraval

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L Taraval
Info
Type	light rail
System	Muni Metro
Locale	San Francisco, California
Terminals	Embarcadero Station 46th Avenue and Wawona
No. of stations	29
Daily ridership	29,842 [1]
Operation
Owner	City of San Francisco
Operator(s)	San Francisco Municipal Railway
Technical
Electrification	overhead catenary
Highest elevation	underground, at grade
Line map edit Embarcadero Montgomery Street Powell Street Civic Center Van Ness J Church and N Judah Church Street Castro Street Eureka Station Forest Hill West Portal K Ingleside and M Ocean View Ulloa and Forest Side Ulloa and 15th Avenue Taraval and 17th Avenue Taraval and 19th Avenue SR 1 Taraval and 22nd Avenue Taraval and 24th Avenue Taraval and 26th Avenue Taraval and 28th Avenue Taraval and 30th Avenue Taraval and 32nd Avenue Taraval and 35th Avenue Taraval and Sunset Taraval and 40th Avenue Taraval and 42nd Avenue Taraval and 44th Avenue Taraval and 46th Avenue To Taraval and 48th stub track 46th Avenue and Ulloa 46th Avenue and Vicente 46th Avenue and Wawona Zoo

L Taraval trains lined up on 47th Avenue near Wawona at the outbound end of the line.

The original end of the L Taraval line. Trains are usually sent here to turn back early, and these are the only tracks left in San Francisco embedded in cobblestone.

The L Taraval is a Muni Metro line in San Francisco, California, mainly serving the Sunset District. It was one of San Francisco's streetcar lines in the early 20th century, and was converted to modern light rail operation with the creation of the Muni Metro system in the late 1970s. While many streetcar lines were converted to buses after World War II, the L Taraval remained a streetcar line due to its use of the Twin Peaks Tunnel.

The line runs from the Embarcadero Station in the Financial District to the 46th Avenue and Wawona Street, near the San Francisco Zoo in the Sunset District. The downtown portion of the line runs in the Market Street Subway, which is shared with six other Muni Metro lines. It continues through the much older Twin Peaks Tunnel, shared by the K Ingleside and M Ocean View lines, emerging at West Portal Station. Once out of the tunnel, the L takes Ulloa Street to 15th Avenue and turns onto Taraval Street. It then follows Taraval to 46th Avenue, where it turns south towards the Zoo. The end of the line loops around Vicente, 47th Avenue and Wawona with the terminal stop on Wawona between 46th and 47th Avenues.

Tracks on Taraval Street extend west from 46th Avenue to 48th Avenue/Great Highway, but they are not used in revenue service. However, chartered streetcars and LRVs can operate there if requested.

The L Taraval line stops at large stations for the downtown section of the route and at smaller stops on the rest of the line. Most of the smaller stops are nothing more than a sign on the side of the street designating a stop and a few others are concrete islands in the middle of the street next to the tracks that provide access for wheelchairs. Muni bus routes provide service to all stations and other systems with access to the stations are noted.

Late-night service is provided by the L-Owl diesel bus line. This line is generally the same as the daytime L Taraval line, except it follows surface streets instead of going through the streetcar-only Market Street Subway and Twin Peaks Tunnel. The line begins at Steuart Street and Market Street, near Embarcadero Station, and follows Market past all of the Market Street Subway's seven underground stations served by the daytime L Taraval line. West of Castro Street, it turns south on Market Street, which becomes Portola Drive. It follows Portola between the Diamond Heights neighborhood and Twin Peaks, turns onto Woodside and then Laguna Honda Boulevard, where it loops around at Forest Hill Station. It then backtracks on Laguna Honda Boulevard, Dewey, Claremont and Ulloa to West Portal Station, where it rejoins the daytime L line.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Muni Metro and San Francisco rail map (195KB PDF)
• L Taraval route information from the SF Muni Map Project