Return trip for streetcars?

URS Corporation Inc.

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Plans to bring a streetcar line to downtown New Haven may ring a bell with some alumni.

In September, the city announced details of a proposal for a $30 million line (photomontage, above) running between Union Station and Science Hill and serving downtown and the medical center. (There’s no funding yet for the plan.) Old Blues remember a vast electric streetcar system that served the city until the late 1940s; passengers used to crowd onto open cars to ride from Union Station to the Yale Bowl on football game days (below).

Manuscripts & Archives

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Residents of Calhoun College so loathed the noise of the streetcars at the busy corner of College and Elm that they threw a Trolley Night celebration when the line shut down in 1948. The Trolley Night parties continue to this day. But Hounies needn’t fear the streetcars' return: the proposed new line would pass more than a block from their corner.