The C was a bus service operated by

AC Transit AC Transit is the main Public transport bus service, bus transit operator in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, California. AC Transit is the third largest bus operator in California, serving the western portions of Alameda and C ...

in the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...

. It is one of the operator's many transbay routes, which are intended to provide riders a long-distance service across the

San Francisco Bay San Francisco Bay (Chochenyo language, Chochenyo: 'ommu) is a large tidal estuary in the United States, U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the cities of San Francisco, California, San ...

between the

East Bay The East Bay is the eastern region of the San Francisco Bay Area and includes cities along the eastern shores of San Francisco Bay and San Pablo Bay. The region has grown to include inland communities in Alameda and Contra Costa counties. Wi ...

and

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. It connected San Francisco with Piedmont Avenue in

Oakland Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major West Coast port, Oakland is ...

and the City of Piedmont. The service was descendant of a

Key System The Key System (or Key Route) was a privately owned company that provided mass transit in the cities of Oakland, Berkeley, Alameda, Emeryville, Piedmont, San Leandro, Richmond, Albany, and El Cerrito in the eastern San Francisco Bay Area ...

streetcar A tram (also known as a streetcar or trolley in Canada and the United States) is an urban rail transit in which vehicles, whether individual railcars or multiple-unit trains, run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some include s ...

and ferry line that operated prior to the formation of AC Transit. The line was suspended in response to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

History

After opening the successful Berkeley line, the Key System's greater corporate interests sought to develop real estate in new neighborhoods adjacent to new streetcar lines. The company's second line was built spurring off the Berkeley main line at Yerba Buena, continuing onto 40th and through a new

cutting Cutting is the separation or opening of a physical object, into two or more portions, through the application of an acutely directed force. Implements commonly used for wikt:cut, cutting are the knife and saw, or in medicine and science the sca ...

between Broadway and Howe to turn onto

Piedmont Piedmont ( ; ; ) is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the northwest Italy, Northwest of the country. It borders the Liguria region to the south, the Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna regions to the east, and the Aosta Valley region to the ...

, ending at 41st Street. The line on 40th east of Grove was rebuilt from a narrow gauge line originally built by the Oakland Consolidated Street Railway. Shuttle service was established in late 1903, and full ferry train service commenced on June 1, 1904. New cars from a scaled-back Lehigh Valley Transit Company expansion were ordered just prior to the line's opening; these were in service for the first several months until new rolling stock matching the Berkeley line was delivered. Local shuttle service was retained with two-axle "dinky" streetcars as a term of the old 40th Street charter. The new service was referred to as the Piedmont Line. Starting on November 21, 1924, the line was extended along existing streetcar tracks on Piedmont, running north to Grand to enter the right of way of the company's abandoned San Jose

interurban The interurban (or radial railway in Canada) is a type of electric railway, with tram-like electric self-propelled railcars which run within and between cities or towns. The term "interurban" is usually used in North America, with other terms u ...

line as far as Oakland Avenue adjacent to Latham Street. Partial bus replacement commenced in May 1931 as part of a cost cutting measure and conversion to

one-man operation One-person operation (OPO), also known as driver-only operation (DOO), one-man operation (OMO), single person train operation (SPTO), or one-person train operation (OPTO), similarly to driver-controlled operation, is operation of a train, bus, ...

. Cars began running across the

San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge The San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, commonly referred to as the Bay Bridge, is a complex of bridges spanning San Francisco Bay in California. As part of Interstate 80 in California, Interstate 80 and the direct road between San Francisco an ...

to the

Transbay Terminal The San Francisco Transbay Terminal was a transportation complex in San Francisco, California, United States, roughly in the center of the rectangle bounded north–south by Mission Street and Howard Street, and east–west by Beale Street an ...

upon the facility's opening in 1939. The Key System adopted letter designations for its transbay routes at this time, with the Piedmont Line designated as route C. Rail service ended after April 20, 1958, and motor coaches began operating on the line.

Public ownership

AC Transit took over operation of the Key System's assets in October 1960. The C line was extended to Highland and Magnolia on June 30, 1963. Buses ceased serving the Transbay Terminal on August 7, 2010, and the San Francisco terminus was moved to the

Temporary Transbay Terminal The San Francisco Transbay Terminal was a transportation complex in San Francisco, California, United States, roughly in the center of the rectangle bounded north–south by Mission Street and Howard Street, and east–west by Beale Street an ...

. The C line began running to the

Salesforce Transit Center The Salesforce Transit Center, also known as the Transbay Transit Center, is a transit center in downtown San Francisco. It serves as the primary bus terminal for the San Francisco Bay Area, and is proposed as a possible future rail terminal. ...

on August 12, 2018. The service was suspended in 2020 amid the

References

Bibliography

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External links

C
— via AC Transit 1903 establishments in California 2020 disestablishments in California Railway lines opened in 1903 Railway lines closed in 1958 Public transportation in Alameda County, California Transportation in Oakland, California Bus routes in San Francisco Transportation in Berkeley, California AC Transit bus routes