Reading this article recently about trolley busses: Get Wired (Again): Trolleybuses and Trolleytrucks, I found myself somewhat surprised that San Francisco was in there as a city with trolley busses. And then I found myself surprised that I was surprised, because it’s not hard to spot trolley busses in San Francisco. I clearly need to pay better attention as I walk around the city. 🤯

The Trolleybuses in San Francisco wikipedia page has a good overview of them. Of course, leave it to San Francisco to also have the steepest grade of any trolley bus in the world:

The system includes the single steepest known grade on any existing trolleybus line in the world (22.8% in the block of Noe Street between Cesar Chavez Street and 26th Street on route 24-Divisadero).

That is pretty close to where I live, and while I haven’t ridden the trolley bus on that stretch, I can confirm that is it pretty steep. Here’s a Google Maps link, in case you want to check it out.

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On the bus stop on 22nd and Mission pretty close to my house, both the MUNI line 14 and 49 apparently have trolleys riding on them. I ride line 49 regularly, but don’t recall it ever being a trolley. But while waiting for my bus recently, this line 14 trolley showed up:

It’s a bit hard to see, so here’s a close up of its roof:

OK OK, the incredibly blue sky in the backdrop also doesn’t hurt. 🙂🌞

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This map by MUNI trolley owl shows that only line 5, 14, 22, and 24 currently have any trolleys riding on them.

Map by CallumC.Gurney - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0

So if you want to ride a trolley bus in San Francisco, you know where to go!

Also see:

• Historic street cars in San Francisco on the F line
• All my other social posts, many of which are about San Francisco

Location of this post on Google Maps opens a new window