Transit to Nature

Transit to Nature. A Lost Railway. , Getting up into the mountains above Altadena from downtown Los Angeles used to be as easy as hopping Lowe Railway, which at the time was the most advanced civil engineering project in the world. Passengers from Altadena boarded the railway at Calaveras Street and Lake Avenue and transferred at Rubio station to the exciting "Incline" department of the railroad. Using improved upon technology developed for San Francisco's cable cars, this lifted them in open cars 3,000 feet to Echo Mountain to what Lowe called "the Switzerland of America." , Three hotels, cabins, restaurants, miles of hiking trails, a zoo, museum, post office, beer garden, mink farm, and other delights attracted a brisk business, especially among well- to-do tourists. In its first year, 60,000 people ascended the mountains to one of the world's first vertically integrated, multifaceted resorts. , In 1906, fires and financial catastrophes forced Lowe to sell his railway and resort to Henry Huntington, who integrated it into his vast Pacific Electric inter-urban railway, the largest such system in the world that ultimately connected over 50 communities in Southern California with 1,164 miles of track. The system also connected the people to our mountains from all over the region, making them a getaway for millions. Altadenans benefited from being able to catch a train every 20 minutes to thousands of Southland destinations. , The Mount Lowe Division of the Pacific Electric Railway closed in 1936 due to the Great Depression and more fires. , From the 1940s through the 1960s, the greatest public transportation system ever built was dismantled as the American love affair with automobiles triggered a frenzy of highway building. Today, clogged freeways and increased commute times have inspired a new round of transportation intrastructure building - as we try to recapture the "freedom" of easily moving around Southern California and into the mountains overlooking our metropolitan area. , photo captions: , Echo Mountain overlooked the San Gabriel Valley below. A series of natural disasters, including fire and floods, left the 'White City' in ruins. Hikers today can still visit the remnants of this once popular resort. , Pacific Electric's Mount Lowe Railway once transported people all the way up to the foot of Mt. Lowe above Altadena.