The FP Line Trolley to SW Portland Cemeteries

On the last day of 1889, the Metropolitan Railway Company staged a trial run of its new electric trolley from downtown Portland south to Fulton Park. As reported the next day in The Morning Oregonian, “some 200 gentlemen” boarded several streetcars at Washington Street and were treated to a scenic trip past the city limits, through the timber, across trestles, up a long grade, and “out on the brow of the hill to the power house in Fulton Park.” The writer exclaimed about the “beautiful view,” including “the Willamette River and country beyond, extending to the Cascades with Mt. Hood looming grandly in the distance.”

But it was more than scenery that interested the Metropolitan’s owners. The brainchild of prominent Portland businessmen (and brothers) James and George Steel, the new trolley route was designed to deliver people to the hillside acreage the Steels had recently purchased and dubbed Fulton Park. Of course the view from those lots was a selling point, but potential customers and residents had to be assured of a safe and efficient ride out to “suburbia.”

That first winter took its toll on the new trolley, with heavy snow interrupting service and frigid temperatures freezing water at the powerhouse, followed by spring landslides that clogged the tracks with mud. But despite the bumpy start, the Steels pushed ahead with their plan to extend the FP Line to three cemeteries beyond Fulton Park. There was another motivation at play: additional investors in the Metropolitan included River View Cemetery founders William Ladd and Henry Pittock, and they were keen on getting people out to visit their beautiful grounds.

So, after battling the elements and making repairs the first year, in the spring of 1891 the Metropolitan principals started laying more track and building more trestles to complete the line. This final section to River View, with stops at Beth Israel and Greenwood Hills cemeteries, opened in May 1891, in much more welcoming weather. Portlanders could now ride the electric trolley six miles out into the suburbs for a mere 5¢. It was an ambitious project, accomplished in a stunningly short amount of time.

And yet the Steel brothers soon abandoned their dream of further extending the line to Oregon City, instead shifting their focus to the east side of the Willamette, while the FP Line continued to run for almost ten years under various names and ownerships. Today, the Metropolitan is largely forgotten, the tracks, the trestles, the electric wires, and the powerhouse all gone. Few photographs or drawings exist and much of the route has been obliterated by I-5 and other development. But a handful of people have unearthed just enough evidence to bring the unlikely story of this trolley to the surface again.

How the FP Line traveled through downtown Portland and out Corbett Avenue

It was just the summer before the launch (1889) that the Metropolitan Railway Company acquired the rights to 2nd Street, where a horse trolley had operated, and began laying standard gauge tracks from NW 2nd and G (Glisan) Street south through the heart of town. The Metropolitan trolley was often referred to as the 2nd Street Line because of its downtown route, even though it traveled in that alignment for only about a third of its course. There was no depot at the north end, the trolley starting and ending unceremoniously amid a concentration of railroad facilities, including the Northern Pacific terminal and Union Station, which was under construction at the time.

(Original Labbe' Caption) Car 13 of the Metropolitan Railway Company poses at the end of the line at Second and Glisan streets shortly after introducing the pleasures of electric streetcars to the citizens of Portland. - W Grande collection - [Labbe, p.68] Handwritten notes on the photo also point out the Steel Bridge, the temporary Northern Pacific depot, and coal bunkers. [N-end-of-Metropolitan-Rwy-Grande.jpg]

At the south end of downtown, the trolley went steeply uphill on 2nd from Mill to Harrison, then turned east on Grant to Front Ave (now Naito Parkway), where it continued south and “bowled across the high bridges to Gibbs,” according to the Oregonian account. This would be a reference to the Marquam Gulch and a lesser gulch at Woods. On Gibbs it went east again to Corbett Avenue. Once southbound on Corbett, it was only about 3/5 mile to the city limits, near Hamilton Street.

Civilization thinned out after Hamilton, and soon the trolley left city streets and headed for the hills.

The FP Line left Corbett at about Slavin Road, crossing at least one wooden trestle to begin a long ascent

On pre-1900 maps, Corbett Avenue seems to end at the gulch at Seymour Street, though we wonder if horse and wagon traffic was able to continue for a short distance on a bridge over the gulch. In any case, we believe the FP Line trundled off to the southwest, probably crossing the gulch obliquely on its own trestle. (At least one newspaper article refers to the Metropolitan Railway Company building a trestle at the Corbett gulch.)

The following three map detail segments show the range of ideas about how the FP Line might have proceeded after Corbett. The first, from an 1891 city map, shows the trolley leaving Corbett where it intersects with Slavin Road, a popular commercial and touring route that wound through the hills and forest to the farms of Hillsdale and beyond; the western section is now called Capitol Highway.

The second image, from an 1892 street renaming map, has the trolley shooting off directly south from Corbett. (Note that the E-W streets were numbered 1st through 4th before the renaming, with 4th becoming Seymour.)

The third detail is from Lewis & Dryden’s Atlas of Portland and Vicinity, 1893, and it shows the trolley sharing a segment of Slavin before heading off across the gulch. (We have an 1889 document from Multnomah County that is a proposal from the Metropolitan Railway Company for a 330' right-of-way along Slavin, but we don’t know for sure if it was approved.) Just for reference, the rail line seen to the left on each map is the Oregon and California Railroad (later the Southern Pacific, then the Red Electric) that came down what is now Barbur Boulevard.

As the trolley headed southwest, it soon met yet another ravine, which it spanned on a curved trestle that fit the contour of the hillside. This curved trestle (above modern-day SW First, Richardson, and Boundary), was later replaced by a sturdier version for the Oregon Electric Railway, traces of which can be seen in mid-20th-century aerial photographs. The I-5 freeway approximates both the Metropolitan and the Oregon Electric routes south of Corbett, and has swallowed up any evidence of those lines.

This evocative photograph from John Labbe’s Fares, Please! shows either the curved trestle or the earlier trestle at Corbett.

Many of our early photographs have sketchy or misleading captions, and the maps we’ve collected are often contradictory, or the result of a developer’s imagination. So, without the Metropolitan’s own surveys and mapping, mysteries persist.

The FP Line skimmed along the east slope of the West Hills, passing over two more trestles and through at least one cut to arrive at Fulton Park.

The Metropolitan headed south from the curved trestle, staying on the steep, forested hillside above the flat land that is now John’s Landing. Riders would have looked down on some bustling industry along the river, including furniture and soap makers, slaughterhouses, and tanneries. Also running along the river were the Willamette Valley Railroad and the White House Road (Macadam), named for the popular hotel/tavern destination farther south. Passengers would also have caught sight of the settlement of Fulton, with its steamboat landing, schoolhouse, and a bit of commerce. Below but not visible from the trolley would have been the first few houses sprouting along Fulton Park Boulevard in the Steels’ new development. One was a model home, an impressive Victorian that still exists as a bed and breakfast. Otherwise the area was mostly unsettled in the 1890s, waiting for Corbett to be extended for both trolley and automobiles.

Map #1 shows our impression of the route of the FP Line between Corbett and Fulton Park along what is now I-5 on an elevation just below the Southern Pacific Railroad (now Barbur Blvd). Past the curved trestle, the right of way was largely in the alignment of SW 1st, then called Connecticut Street, but a street only on paper.

The FP Line crossed the Iowa and Vermont ravines on high trestles. Our explorations under the contemporary bridges on Barbur and I-5 have turned up old piers for the Red Electric on both sides of the ravines, under and to the east of Barbur — but no Metropolitan Railway piers, which we assume were lost to I-5. The closest we’ve come to pinpointing the alignment of the FP Line in that area was learning about a concrete retaining wall built between the two trestles in 1913 for the Oregon Electric, which experienced the same landslide problems the FP Line had. The remaining wall segment on the west side of I-5 was covered with ivy until ODOT revealed it before removing it for a detour lane during the rebuilding of the Iowa overpass in 2010-11. The wall has its own [PAGE].

Just after the Vermont trestle, we believe the FP Line approached Fulton Park through a man-made trench, or 'cut', aligned with what is now SW Brier Place. The location of the trench fits the Morning Oregonian account of the Metropolitan's first run, in which the writer described the route to the powerhouse as “a little below the O&C line” (now Barbur Blvd). What we’ve named the Brier Place Trench is clearly visible on LIDAR imagery as well as to a pedestrian reaching the dead end on Brier Place. It is the most convincing bit of physical evidence we’ve found of the Metropolitan’s route, and more pronounced than a berm we’ve also seen north of the trench between Slavin Road and I-5. See more about the Brier Place Trench, including photos, on its own [PAGE].

The FP Line stopped at Fulton Park, where the powerhouse was located

Fulton Park was the end of the FP Line until the extension to the cemeteries was finished in June 1891. Besides being a real estate destination, Fulton Park was the site of a powerhouse that produced electricity for the trolley. The 120’ x 36’ structure, combining powerhouse, carbarn, shop, and employees’ accommodations, was sited on a slope just off the then Oregon & California/Southern Pacific Railroad, now Barbur. This setting provided wood and water to fuel the powerhouse, as well as access to the railroad.

For a few years we considered several sites for the powerhouse within Fulton Park, but now we’re certain it was located at the north end of the ravine between the current school grounds and community gardens (See the red rectangle in Map #2 below). Map #2 shows the way we believe the tracks led from the Brier Place Trench through Fulton Park, with some configuration of tracks (not shown) into and out of the west end of the powerhouse/carbarn.

Trolley cars could enter the building on the main level. Up to 15 cars could be stored there, with pits under the tracks for maintenance. Dynamos and boilers were on the lower, downslope level. The third floor contained bunk rooms heated by the steam room below, and there was a water tank nearby to store water from local sources.

We have only one photograph of the powerhouse, and while it’s evocative, it poses as many questions as it answers. This undated photo, a version of which appeared on p. 66 of the Labbe book, shows a party of Metropolitan riders arriving at the Fulton powerhouse in an open summer car. By our figuring, this would be the north face of the building, which backed up to the ravine, but we have yet to interpret the track layout or whether the car was turning around here or continuing on to the cemeteries. Note the stacks of firewood and the elevated water tower to the left.

Our first inkling of the location of the powerhouse came from an 1890 bird’s eye illustration. Bird’s eyes were a popular map/illustration hybrid in the late 19th century that could show what was on the ground before aerial photographs were possible, and they were surprisingly accurate despite some artistic license. In this detail of a large Portland-wide illustration, note the Metropolitan tracks crossing Slavin Road on their approach to Fulton Park, then almost meeting up with the O&C tracks before heading to the powerhouse with its chimney and water tower. The house just to the northeast of the powerhouse was built in 1880 and would have witnessed these developments. It is still standing on S Miles Street, opposite the current Fulton Park School.

The precise location of the powerhouse remained one of our bigger mysteries until we saw it pop out from a map in the Lewis & Dryden 1893 Atlas of Portland and Vicinity. Second Street on this map is now an access road within the community gardens, but at the time it was part of the grid and marked the return of the “2nd Street Line” to its original downtown alignment after a long traverse of the hills. The track interface with the carbarn on this map is no doubt simplified and doesn’t match the powerhouse photo above or the reality of getting cars into and out of the barn and on their way to the cemeteries.

The discovery of this map gave more credence to a curious feature we’d seen on a LIDAR map: a rectangular footprint in the ravine that echoed the dimensions of the powerhouse.

These two clues prompted us to bushwhack in the ravine, where we made a rough survey and uncovered brick fragments and a cement post that could well be left over from the demolition of the powerhouse. It was incredible to us that such a substantial structure could just vanish into thin air, so it was a big breakthrough to begin to establish its existence with physical evidence as well as cartographic. For much more about the Fulton Park powerhouse history, location, and operations, you can visit its own [PAGE],

“Transit-oriented development” may seem like a recent concept, but it was the modus operandi of the Steel Brothers, and was already underway at Fulton Park when the FP Line first arrived. In its report on the Metropolitan’s inaugural ride, The Morning Oregonian noted, “The ground in the vicinity of the power house has been cleared and several handsome cottages built thereon… There is a fine view from the park and plenty of beautiful places for building, which now that the motor line is completed, will speedily be utilized.” This may have been overly optimistic, and we don’t know the extent of residential construction during the decade the FP Line ran through Fulton Park. You can see a handful of “cottages” on the bird’s eye map and in the powerhouse photo, but only two pre-1900 houses still exist in the powerhouse area, along with about nine on the hillside below. To read more about the Fulton Park real estate development, see this [PAGE].

The FP Line left Fulton Park via a trestle over Stephens Creek to Carson Heights

On March 20, 1891, The Morning Oregonian reported that surveyors were at work south of Fulton Park in preparation for the trolley, and the next day announced that “The (Metropolitan Railway) company will at once begin the work of extending its line from Fulton Park to the cemeteries.” While they missed their Memorial Day deadline for service to River View, they did get passengers as far as Beth Israel by May 30, an incredible feat that included one more major trestle.

That trestle would carry the FP Line trolley over Stephens Creek, which carved a deep ravine on its way to the Willamette River. (Stephens Creek is now spanned upstream by the Terwilliger Bridge.) The Oregonian continued on March 20, “In fact, lumber is now being delivered for the trestle just south of the power house. This is to be rather an extensive affair, being 900 feet long, 90 feet high at the center, and 24 feet in width, with sidewalks.”

No physical trace of the Stephens Creek trestle has yet been found, but we recently discovered a ~1907 photograph that we’re sure depicts the abandoned trestle. The photo was taken by Fred H. Kiser, a Portland photographer who was engaged by the Oregon Electric Railway to document the final stages of construction of that interurban. Kiser’s aim in this photo was to show the fill on which the OE tracks were laid in the slide-prone Fulton Park area (in the current alignment of I-5). But what caught our eye in the background was the wooden trestle that has to be the one that carried the FP Line across Stephens Creek, by then in disuse for 7-8 years. Also visible is the first Fulton Park School, which was replaced in 1914 by the existing school farther to the east.

We still have many questions about where the trestle started and ended, and are working on a page addressing the various possibilities. What makes sense is that it would connect two equivalent elevations, e.g. from the level of the Fulton community gardens to a spot partway up the incline of SW Crestline Drive in Carson Heights.

Further confusing our research is the mention of a shorter trestle in an April 13, 1891, Oregonian article: “Work on the trestles just beyond the south city limits at Fulton Park for the extension of the motor line to the cemeteries, is progressing rapidly. The first about 400 feet long, is completed, and the second…is well under way.” Did the shorter one span the powerhouse ravine or was it farther along in Carson Heights, perhaps at Taylors Ferry Road? Stay tuned and watch for our Stephens Creek trestle page.

What seems certain is that the big trestle initially traveled in the 2nd Street alignment from the powerhouse, and that when it landed across the ravine, the trolley followed a natural arm of land along and near where Crestline Drive is today. As you’ll see on the map below, the FP Line angled southwest to present-day SW Hume, where it went straight south along the 5th Street alignment to Carson, then angled again to the southwest through what is now the commercial complex at Terwilliger and Taylors Ferry at the top of the hill.

The FP Line reaches the three southwest cemeteries

Crossing Taylors Ferry, the FP Line continued along the western edge of Beth Israel Cemetery, parallel with today’s Terwilliger Boulevard. The cemetery land was acquired in 1871 by the Congregation Beth Israel to replace their small burial ground in burgeoning South Portland. While Beth Israel has found no documents referring to trolley service to their grounds, we discovered a right-of-way deed dated November 1890 that granted Metropolitan Railway Company the right to lay single or double tracks along an existing lane in the cemetery. Beth Israel specified a number of conditions, including the sharing of electricity to run their irrigation system and the guarantee that the trolley fare to the cemetery would not exceed 10 cents. Right of Way Deed PDF

By Memorial Day 1891, the FP Line tracks were completed as far as Beth Israel Cemetery. As The Oregonian reported on May 30, “The track of the Metropolitan Street Railway Company has been extended out to the Hebrew cemetery and the cars will be running out there today for the accommodation of persons wishing to visit the cemeteries. They will land passengers within a stone’s throw of the Masonic cemetery [Greenwood Hills] and only a short distance from the western boundary of Riverview.” Sometime between then and late July the trolley was taking passengers all the way to River View Cemetery.

We’ve stitched together three section maps from Lewis & Dryden’s Atlas of Portland and Vicinity (1893) to illustrate the FP Line’s trajectory from Fulton Park to the cemeteries. While the distance from Fulton Park to River View is only 2/3 mile as the crow flies, the Metropolitan had to build a mile and a half of track, including trestles, to get through the rugged, largely undeveloped land.

On these maps, the Metropolitan is labeled “Fulton Park Electric Line,” one of many names for the trolley over its ten years. The 1893 plats and street names were very different in what now comprises the South Burlingame and Collins View neighborhoods, but the main features are recognizable: the Southern Pacific RR (Barbur), the Fulton Park area and the powerhouse at 2nd and Miles, the settlement of Fulton, Taylors Ferry and Boones Ferry Roads, and the three cemeteries. One thing not recorded on the map is Stephens Creek, which runs just south of and parallel to Custer. Also, the street grid shown in Carson Heights differs from both the fanciful layout proposed by the Fulton Park developers and current platting. So while it may look as though the trolley was traveling along streets, it was just open country at the time.

At the southwest corner of Beth Israel, the trolley swung an arc through what would become the Kilpatrick-Collins tract and crossed Boones Ferry Road into Greenwood Hills Cemetery.

The FP Line traverses Greenwood Hills Cemetery to a depot at River View Cemetery

As the trolley entered what was then the Portland Masonic Cemetery, it would have passed by a caretaker's house, built in 1878 and now the oldest existing residence in the neighborhood by a few decades. The rural cemetery, later known as Greenwood and Greenwood Hills, was founded by the Masons in 1883. Two acres were soon sold to the Grand Army of the Republic and sometime later a slightly larger plot was sold to the Progress Lodge of the Odd Fellows (IOOF) for their own burials.

Below are two contradictory maps showing the route of the FP Line through Greenwood Hills. The 1893 Lewis & Dryden map has the trolley dipping down around a marshy area, heading straight north close to an existing road, and curving through the IOOF section on its way to River View. On the 1897 Multnomah County survey map, the route is clearly marked as following the existing road around a pond until it goes north between graves and then curves around the northern edge of the IOOF section.

Both maps agree, however, that the trolley traveled on a double track along the main entry road at the top of Section 1. We are currently working on how the survey map, which is likely the more accurate of the two, plays out on the ground in terms of land contours and grave locations. We also need to track down a map that fills in the route between Greenwood and River View.

---

Here is a larger version of the above 1897 map PL0200-050-052 [PNG].

A Depot at River View Cemetery

The existence and location of a possible depot at River View Cemetery was more elusive. We saw references to a depot but had no proof other than one ambiguous photograph. “Car to Cemetery” was taken by Rev. George H. Lee on July 13, 1898, when he rode the FP Line out to River View to visit the graves of family and friends, a trip he referenced in his diary (OHS Mss 1329). The photo also appears in Labbe’s book, where the car was said to be “in the Cemeteries station at the southern end of the Metropolitan Line” (p. 70).

After much parsing of the words “to” and “in” in these captions, we came upon two definitive pieces of evidence for the location of the depot. The first was an 1892 deed in which landowners John C. and Eliza Ann Carson sold .918 acre at the western edge of River View Cemetery to the Metropolitan Railway Company. Since the deed was a sale and not an easement, there was no mention of the future use of the land. But then we discovered an 1895 notice in the Morning Oregonian about a bank foreclosure on then owners of the FP Line, the Portland Consolidated Street Railway Company. Described in the notice were the legal boundaries of the .918 acre and “the depot, car-house and station situated thereon, being the terminus of said line of railway running to Riverview cemetery.” (See foreclosure notice in our Resource Collection. [PDF])

That cinched it. We were now sure the “Car to Cemetery” photo was taken at the end of the line, but our next job was to find the exact location of the depot acre, both on maps and on the ground. Using the metes and bounds in the deed language, we determined that the 200’ x 200’ piece of land abutted Section 15 of River View, which was then the cemetery’s western boundary and the eastern extent of the Carsons’ property. That level piece of ground in what later became Sections 101-103 of River View was a logical place for a trolley station in the otherwise hilly terrain cut with ravines.

From the Rev. Lee photo we can see that the depot was built in the same style as the Fulton Powerhouse/carbarn on a smaller scale, with a possible waiting room and office but no car storage or mechanical facilities. (See Hypothetical Depot Plan below.) But the photo also raises further questions, including how the station was oriented on the acre and what lies beyond the front of the car. While the photo doesn’t depict a funeral but a visit by a church group, we also wonder how (or if) cemetery carriages might have interfaced with such a depot to pick up passengers and caskets and deliver them to gravesites.

The last missing piece of the cemeteries puzzle was how the trolley ran from Greenwood Hills to the depot at the edge of River View. We walked the distance countless times on various routes, trying to “think like a trolley,” but the answer came in yet another, earlier deed from the Carsons. This one was an easement dated March 1891, just as the extension from Fulton Park was beginning to be built out. The language in this deed was more vague, loosely describing a 20-foot-wide right-of-way between two known points: where the tracks exited the north boundary of Greenwood Hills and the .918 depot acre. But we knew that the route had to stay within the Carson property (defined by the southern boundary of the Thomas Northrup Donation Land Claim) and away from a precipitous ravine, which caused us to zero in on a modern cemetery road where a dirt shed is now located. This road was probably built around 1911 to connect to newly acquired areas of the cemetery, using the alignment of the Metropolitan. By then, both the easement and the depot acre had been conveyed to River View by the City & Suburban Railway, the new owner of the Metropolitan as of 1900.

This map is a rough sketch of the route we believe the FP Line followed between Greenwood Hills and River View.

We’ve come a long way in understanding how the Fulton Park Line traveled to and through the cemeteries, but many details of its scenic six-mile route remain hard to pin down. We’ll continue to search for answers in public records, private photograph collections, books, and newspaper accounts…while keeping our boots on the ground!

The Look of the Fulton Park Electric Line

The Metropolitan made a strong visual statement along its six-mile route. The trolley line’s electrical poles were painted an eye-catching green, cream, and vermilion to match the first cars, the effect of which is lost in the old sepia-toned photographs.

The photos do show that the FP Line cars were handsome, featuring rich wood and glass, bold signage, and snappily dressed conductors. The first cars operating on the route were ordered from the Pullman Company and were either enclosed or open to the air. (Pullman Car 12 is shown at the beginning of this section.) Riders had complained seasonally of being either too hot or too cold, so convertible cars were added to the inventory. In 1891, the Metropolitan took delivery of the first Portland-made trolley cars, built by Vulcan Manufacturing Company (later known as Columbia Car and Tool Company) at a carhouse on Second and Montgomery. These convertible cars provided year-round comfort, with hinged window panels that could be kept closed during the winter or propped up against the roof to let the air-flow cool the passengers in the summer.

Funeral Cars

For a trolley line that served three cemeteries, it’s surprising how little information there is about funeral cars. We’ve found a few references to special decorated cars in newspaper articles like this one, describing the 1891 funeral of a prominent member of several fraternal orders: “The remains were escorted to the corner of Second and Madison streets, where the funeral car was in waiting on the Second Street electric line. The car was handsomely draped with funeral emblems and decorated with flowers.” (Interestingly, this cortège was delayed due to vandalism of one of the funeral cars!) And for an 1899 Masonic burial, “the procession marched to the West Side over Morrison bridge, where special cars were provided for all who desired to go to Greenwood cemetery.”

We’ve found only two descriptions of the cars themselves, and it’s unknown how many there were or when they came on line. The first mention was in the “Street Railway Journal” in May 1893: “The funeral car is arranged with a space in front, in which the coffin is placed, and with seats for forty people. The car is trimmed with black curtains and tassels, and is painted in somber colors. This car is frequently chartered for funerals, and makes a convenient means for reaching the cemetery which is about six miles distant from the city.” (See PAGE 22 in the David Stearns papers in our Resource Collection for this reference.) The existence of two funeral cars is also mentioned in a 1943 article in the Oregon Historical Quarterly by Randall V. Mills, also cited in our Resource Collection.

As for photographic evidence, we keep coming across Car 1500, the “Zelig” of Portland’s trolley era. Initiated on the Metropolitan line as a single-truck gas-electric car, that failed experiment was converted to a double-truck electric car that popped up on other lines as a funeral car, company car, and mail car. One feature that made it different from the usual trolley car was the addition of a center door that presumably made it easier to load caskets. There are numerous photos of Car 1500 but none decked out for a funeral.

The Demise of the FP Line

When you consider all the factors working against the FP Line, it’s somewhat surprising that it lasted nearly ten years. It was an expensive line to run because of the rugged, unstable terrain, and a powerhouse hungry for firewood and water. Little wonder that the Steel Brothers turned their attention to the east side with its gentler terrain. In fact, shortly before buying the East Side Railway Company and selling the Metropolitan in May of 1892, the Steel Brothers had moved most power generation from the Fulton Park powerhouse to an East Portland location next to a sawmill that provided waste to burn.

The FP Line changed hands several times through the tumultuous decade that followed. First the Panic of 1893 struck, making it more difficult for trolley companies to attract investment and for cash-strapped families to buy or build new homes. Splashy ads for Fulton Park real estate all but disappeared from papers and magazines. Then the Flood of 1894 seriously interrupted trolley operations and power generation across the city. The trolley infrastructure started falling into disrepair.

The Portland Consolidated Street Railway Company, which had acquired a number of trolley lines including the Metropolitan in 1892, went into foreclosure in 1895. Still, the FP Line kept running and improvements were made to the system by its next owner. But when the City & Suburban Railway took over in 1897, it was the beginning of the end of this unique route. The new operators began dismantling the Fulton Park powerhouse, and replacing the standard gauge tracks downtown with narrow gauge to conform to the rest of Portland’s trolley lines. The change in gauge required FP Line passengers to transfer to a different car on Corbett at Abernethy Street, another death knell for the line.

The City & Suburban must have decided it would be cheaper and easier to run their cars through what is now John’s Landing, and by 1899 the FP Line’s tracks were being pulled up and trestles removed, with no remaining trace. The iron, wood, and wires were probably reused elsewhere, possibly to build out the City & Suburban’s Corbett route. By 1900 the narrow gauge tracks on Corbett had been extended to the Fulton community, and soon after to a lower entrance (pedestrian-only access point) of River View Cemetery on Taylors Ferry Road. This was the N-S Line, which we describe on its own page: [N-S LINE].

The FP Line had a good run despite many physical and economic obstacles. Along with other electric trolleys, the Metropolitan helped extend travel and settlement beyond the city core. But soon the public would be wanting to widen their horizons even more, and the “little trolleys that could” eventually ceded some of their territory to larger, longer distance trains, thus ushering in the era of the interurban.

Questions to Answer about the FP Line!

• When the F-Line left Corbett to cross the gulch there, did it use a trestle that never showed up on any map? (The Sanborn 1909 Map shows a trestle for an Electric RY, but the F-line preceded that by decades.) (There were two trestles there.)
• When was the Fulton Park Powerhouse structure itself removed, and where were those materials re-used?
• Where exactly was the trestle that crossed from Fulton Park toward what is now the South Burlingame Neighborhood?
• Where exactly was the depot at the southern end of the Metropolitan Railway Line? (We have this down to within 100'.)
• Where did the iron rails come from? (England? The Midwest, via transcontinental railroad?)
• Are there any vestiges of these trolley rail lines anywhere in South Burlingame, Collins View, Lair Hill, South Portland, or John's Landing?
• Do any Trolley cars like the ones shown here exist anywhere?
• Other Questions?

Please Honor our Creative Commons License

The Trolley Project, Portland, Oregon.