Funiculars

With the investigation of the fatal Angeles Flight accident focusing on mechanical failure, investigators moved Wednesday to lift the two antique cable cars from their Bunker Hill tracks and truck them to a warehouse. A huge, 150-ton overhead crane was brought from Long Beach and outfitted with special sling devices to hoist the cars onto flatbed trucks, said Ted Turpin, a National Transportation Safety Board investigator. The operation was expected to be completed this morning. John H.

Olivet and Sinai rarely bother with finances: They're too busy ferrying passengers up and down Bunker Hill. Earlier this month however, the twin Angels Flight coaches were credited with holding a decidedly monetary debate over their 25-cent fare, via Twitter. "A lot of riders (and many of our donors) say that 25 cents is too inexpensive," Olivet tweeted. "Revenues cover less than half our expenses. " "50 cent fare, then?" Sinai suggested. " 50 Cent? Isn't he a singer?

If you are rich, but your legs are weary; if your home is perched high on a hill, but your garage is down below; if you don't feel compelled to climb every mountain, you may have traveled on a rare contraption that most of us have trouble pronouncing. Call them funiculars, hillevators or hillevettes. Call them by their boring, regulatory name: incline elevators.

When the black-and-orange funicular cars of Angels Flight resumed rattling up and down Bunker Hill two months ago, they were justly hailed as a link to the city's past. After all, the 298-foot-long ride — dubbed "the smallest railway in the world" — dates to 1901. Don't expect comebacks, however, from some other past transit systems, such as the San Pedro-L.A. camel train, the Aerial Swallow monorail, the Pasadena Cycleway and L.A. River Cruises. Each flamed out. L.A.'s brief camel era began in 1863 after the city was given 28 of the creatures from the 1st U.S. Army Camel Corps.

A two-day settlement conference has been scheduled to begin July 20 in a lawsuit filed over a death and serious injury in the Feb. 1 Angels Flight funicular accident, according to attorneys for both sides. Representatives of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency, the Angels Flight Railway Foundation and operating company and Pueblo Contracting Services have agreed to go before an Alternative Dispute Resolution mediator, along with representatives of the Leon and Lola Praport family.

Its official name is the Johnstown Inclined Plane, but residents here call it the Heavenly Hoist. The Inclined railway's two cars whiz up and down the steep 896.5-foot, 72%-grade Yoder Hill 65 times a day, one trip every 15 minutes. It's fast, smooth, quiet like an elevator going at a slant. Ninety seconds, and it's all over. Regular commuters living in the hillside residential community of Westmont ride the Inclined Plane to work and school every day.

Southern California's emerging mass transit network has all the earmarks of 21st-Century technology. Yet sometimes old-fashioned technology is, if not best, certainly more enduring. Work began last week on restoration of Angels Flight, the funicular railway that operated on Bunker Hill between 1901 and 1969. Few people were on hand in 1969 when Angels Flight's two cars made their last runs along the 315-foot railway, victims of declining ridership in a deteriorating central city.

Despite their private engineers' warnings that track brakes were necessary on the Angels Flight cable cars, city redevelopment officials allowed the builders to alter the design in 1995 to eliminate those brakes and other safety features from the funicular system, city records show.

No Public Utilities Commission inspection of Angels Flight was performed for four years after the block-long downtown railway resumed service in 1996, PUC records show. When a formal inspection was conducted last year, it consisted mainly of a review of the railway company's records rather than a direct inspection of the operating parts of the cable system, the PUC's inspector assigned to the railway said Wednesday. The inspector, PUC transportation engineer Joey E.

When she was a child in the 1960s, one of Monique Birault's favorite weekend excursions was heading downtown with her mother from their Echo Park home to ride the Angels Flight railway up and down Bunker Hill, followed by a visit to Olvera Street. Birault, now a Santa Monica architect, recalled those happy outings Saturday as she painted the railings along the railway, closed since a 2001 crash that killed a passenger.

The California Public Utilities Commission has approved the safety certificate for the historic Angels Flight rail line in downtown L.A., nine years after a fatal accident closed the funicular. In a letter to Angels Flight Railway Co., the PUC said that it had "no major safety concerns" regarding the rail line, which runs up and down Bunker Hill. The company has faced numerous delays in reopening Angels Flight. John Welborne, head of a nonprofit foundation that is trying to reopen the funicular, said he was pleased by the PUC's decision, calling it an important step forward.

When she was a child in the 1960s, one of Monique Birault's favorite weekend excursions was heading downtown with her mother from their Echo Park home to ride the Angels Flight railway up and down Bunker Hill, followed by a visit to Olvera Street. Birault, now a Santa Monica architect, recalled those happy outings Saturday as she painted the railings along the railway, closed since a 2001 crash that killed a passenger.

The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved the city's part of a proposed $3-million settlement with the family of a Holocaust survivor who was killed in the Angels Flight funicular accident Feb. 1. The council voted unanimously to authorize the city Community Redevelopment Agency to pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit alleging the wrongful death of Leon Praport, 83, and the serious injury of his wife, Lola, 81.

A two-day settlement conference has been scheduled to begin July 20 in a lawsuit filed over a death and serious injury in the Feb. 1 Angels Flight funicular accident, according to attorneys for both sides. Representatives of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency, the Angels Flight Railway Foundation and operating company and Pueblo Contracting Services have agreed to go before an Alternative Dispute Resolution mediator, along with representatives of the Leon and Lola Praport family.

They huff, they puff, they trudge, they rest. They blow out big cheekfuls of air and lean back, gazing at the summit. You can almost hear them thinking, how much more? Since a deadly Feb. 1 crash halted operation of downtown's Angels Flight railway, a stream of people can be seen on any given weekday, attacking the 153 steps between Hill Street and California Plaza, the only remaining route up that stretch of the steep hill the funicular used to climb.

The family of Leon Praport, an 83-year-old Holocaust survivor who died last month in the Angels Flight crash, will file a lawsuit against the city and private firms involved in restoring and operating the historic funicular, an attorney announced Thursday. Lawyer Gary A. Dordick said the suit, also being filed on behalf of Praport's wife, Lola, who survived the Feb. 1 crash, will seek a judgment compelling the city to restore Angels Flight to full service with new, safe equipment.

Olivet and Sinai rarely bother with finances: They're too busy ferrying passengers up and down Bunker Hill. Earlier this month however, the twin Angels Flight coaches were credited with holding a decidedly monetary debate over their 25-cent fare, via Twitter. "A lot of riders (and many of our donors) say that 25 cents is too inexpensive," Olivet tweeted. "Revenues cover less than half our expenses. " "50 cent fare, then?" Sinai suggested. " 50 Cent? Isn't he a singer?

The family of Leon Praport, an 83-year-old Holocaust survivor who died last month in the Angels Flight crash, will file a lawsuit against the city and private firms involved in restoring and operating the historic funicular, an attorney announced Thursday. Lawyer Gary A. Dordick said the suit, also being filed on behalf of Praport's wife, Lola, who survived the Feb. 1 crash, will seek a judgment compelling the city to restore Angels Flight to full service with new, safe equipment.

Despite their private engineers' warnings that track brakes were necessary on the Angels Flight cable cars, city redevelopment officials allowed the builders to alter the design in 1995 to eliminate those brakes and other safety features from the funicular system, city records show.

No Public Utilities Commission inspection of Angels Flight was performed for four years after the block-long downtown railway resumed service in 1996, PUC records show. When a formal inspection was conducted last year, it consisted mainly of a review of the railway company's records rather than a direct inspection of the operating parts of the cable system, the PUC's inspector assigned to the railway said Wednesday. The inspector, PUC transportation engineer Joey E.