Its been a long time coming and a long hard battle to get to this point. I feel more ownership in the streetcar than I really deserve, I was just a drop of water in the stream. But enough drops of water can move mountains. And I feel like that is what we have done in Cincinnati, move mountains. I believe it truly took everyone in the city to get this project done.
But the day had come, I felt like Christmas morning and these were two of the first people we saw Friday morning. I couldn't get over all the 3,4, 5yr and older t-shirts I saw being worn.
I knew the streetcar was a big deal, but it didn't really hit me just
how big a deal the streetcar was until the mayor of Portland walked into Taste of Belgium while we were eating breakfast. Then we ran into a group of streetcar supporters from Kansas City who have our sister streetcars. And after that we met a group of streetcar advocates from Poznan, Poland.
Earl Clark, was one of the final riders before Cincinnati's streetcar ended operating on April 29, 1951. I heard he is a huge rail buff and rode the last streetcar for hours until it was shut down and he was literally the last person off.
But first, we had speeches, lots of them. And kicking it all off was Mr. Streetcar John Schnieder continuing with all the others who contributed. You may notice there was a lot of finger pointing. And they were all pointing to Uptown! Lets do it
Chris Seelbach: "Things just got rail!"
"When I say: 'Let's go!' You say: 'Streetcar!' " Simpson shouted.
Let's go!
Streetcar!
Let's go!
Streetcar!
And then instead of cutting a ribbon they powered the streetcar up with Cincy Red Bike pedal power.
And then we were off and running..............
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2 streetcar bells
Bob,you always come through with the best pics.
ReplyDeleteThanks John!
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