Water and Power Associates Informing the Public about Critical Water and Energy Issues facing Los Angeles and California

Historical Notes

In the mid to late 1800s, Los Angeles began growing faster than anywhere in the country. By 1870, the City's population increased to 5,730, a 350% jump from when it was incorporated as a municipality in 1850.  By 1900, LA's population would mushroom to over 100,000 people.

Historical Notes

Most of the land east of Main Street between 6th and 9th Street was owned by Ozro W. Childs.

Childs obtained the contract to build an extension of the Zanja Madre, a canal system to bring water to the fields south of the pueblo. He was paid in land in that area – all now within present day Downtown Los Angeles - from 6th to 9th, and Main to Figueroa Street.

This property was the foundation of his fortune. He built a substantial house at 10th and Main, then a half-mile from town center, and on his property took up planting. In his day, Ozro Childs was Los Angeles’s most prominent plantsman, with a Plant nursery.

Childs was also involved in philanthropic work. When Judge Robert Maclay Widney set out to create a university in Los Angeles in the 1870s, he received assistance from donors including Childs. In 1879, Childs contributed a considerable amount of land to the founding of the University of Southern California, which opened in 1880.

Historical Notes

This intersection had a distinctive configuration, with Spring and Main Streets splitting at 9th Street to form a triangular-shaped block. This unusual layout made it one of the most photographed intersections in downtown Los Angeles over the years. The split created a complex traffic pattern, with trolley tracks running through the center of the intersection.

Historical Notes

In the early 1900s, the intersection of Main, Spring, and 9th streets in Los Angeles was a key commercial hub. This area was part of the city’s growing downtown, bustling with activity as Los Angeles expanded rapidly. Main and Spring Streets were lined with a variety of businesses, shops, and important buildings, including banks and offices that catered to the city's growing population.

Spring Street, in particular, was known as the "Wall Street of the West" due to the concentration of financial institutions that emerged there during this period. The intersection itself would have been a convergence point for both pedestrians and horse-drawn wagons, reflecting the dynamic urban environment of Los Angeles as it transitioned from a frontier town to a booming metropolitan area.

Additionally, the area was home to significant buildings such as the Copeland Building (also known as the Armory Building), which stood prominently on the corner of Spring and 8th streets.

Historical Notes

Because of its unique shape, the intersection of Main, Spring and 9th streets would become over the years one of the most phototgraphed intersection in downtown Los Angeles.

Historical Notes

In the early part of the 1900s, elevated booths as seen above were used by the Los Angeles Railway and the Yellow Cars as a switchman’s tower to control the flow and path of streetcars through the intersection.

Click HERE to see a map of the Los Angeles Railway System (Includes: LARy/Yellow Cars, PERy/Red Cars, LA Inter-Urban, LA Pacific R.R., and the LA & Redondo Ry).

Historical Notes

The raised kiosk was manned with an operator who would control the traffic signal and help with the flow of traffic at the complex intersection.

Historical Notes

To get cars and commerce moving through the downtown business district, Los Angeles installed its first automated traffic signals in October 1920. These early signals, manufactured by the Acme Traffic Signal Co., paired “Stop” and “Go” semaphore arms with small red and green lights. Bells played the role of today’s amber or yellow lights, ringing when the flags changed—a process that took five seconds.

Historical Notes

The Los Angeles Railway (LARy), was a system of streetcars in Los Angeles between 1895 and 1945.

It operated on 3 foot, 6 inch (1,067 mm) narrow-gauge tracks and connected the city center to neighborhoods in about a six-mile radius of downtown.

There were about 642 miles of track at its peak in 1924.

The system was informally known as the “Yellow Cars,” similar to the Pacific Electric Railway’s “Red Cars” which served more outlying areas.

Historical Notes

In the background is Signal's "oomph" billboard with the lady herself, Ann Sheridan.

Note how crowded the sky is with wires here.

Historical Notes

This intersection had so much potential to become an iconic public space in LA, just as Latham Square is in Oakland, or Times Square is in Manhattan. But….that never materialized.

Historical Notes

In the above shot taken on May 23, 1950, Los Angeles Transit Lines car no. 1293 heads south on Main Street working the 8 line. Waiting to make to right turn from Spring St, onto 9th is LATL car no. 1307 working the N line. In the distance, a PE car on the Watts-Sierra Vista line can be seen heading north on Main St. Soon, the N and Sierra Vista lines would be no more.

Historical Notes

The streetcar system was sold by Huntington’s estate in 1945 to National City Lines and renamed Los Angeles Transit Lines.

National City Lines was already under scrutiny for the practice of purchasing streetcar lines and replacing them with buses.

In a rare reversal, National City Lines actually invested not only in improved rail lines, but electric trolley buses as well, with the first group of 40 ACF-Brill coaches having been ordered by Oakland’s Key System, which itself was purchased by National City Lines who transferred the coaches to Los Angeles.

The system slowly morphed into a bus system over the years until the last streetcar ran in 1963.

The last streetcar lines of the Yellow Cars were taken over by a government agency, the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority (not to be confused with the current Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority) in 1958.

The agency removed the remaining five streetcar lines on March 30, 1963.