Autumn XXV. Autumn to winter + cable cars

Intro & Preface & Contents

Previous: Autumn XXIV. Waking too early

Yesterday I passed by an elm avenue, leading to a beautiful old house. The road between the trees was covered in all its length and breadth with fallen leaves -- a carpet of pale gold. Further on, I came to a plantation, mostly of larches; it shone in the richest aureate hue, with here and there a splash of blood-red, which was a young beech in its moment of autumnal glory.

I looked at an alder, laden with brown catkins, its blunt foliage stained with innumerable shades of lovely colour. Near it was a horse-chestnut, with but a few leaves hanging on its branches, and those a deep orange. The limes, I see, are already bare.

To-night the wind is loud, and rain dashes against my casement; to-morrow I shall awake to a sky of winter.

Alpha.

Elms -- not anymore, I would guess. Here the descent into winter is rather subtle. This tends to be one of two times each year when the temperature is particularly cold, sometimes for a period of weeks. People take the opportunity to wear their gloves and scarves and heavier coats, though you can just as easily get by without any of that. The thing about a place where it never gets really hot or really cold is that when it does trend noticeably one way or the other, you feel it disproportionately.

We are at the same latitude as southern Italy (if only Goethe had visited we might have a good quote or two), which is why we share a similar “Mediterranean” light, so we don’t experience the near perpetual darkness of northern winters, but even here the darkness makes an impression. Our air quality tends to be good, but there is something breathtaking about the crystal clear air after a storm front has passed through. Hills and mountains, islands and far shores, that seemed distant or invisible before, now appear close enough to walk to. When, after a particularly cold storm, the tops of the three or four tallest mountains around the bay are dusted with snow, you can squint your eyes and imagine you are on Puget Sound or someplace similarly dramatic. But here it is as hard to believe in real winter, as in death. And the municipal fondness of late for planting palm trees only emphasizes our resistance to nature's usual cycles. Still, it only takes a good El Niño winter to remind you that life isn’t all sweetness and light. We could really use a drenching El Niño right about now.

Cable cars.

Even 20 years ago people were constantly filming and photographing the cable cars running down the street near my building, but now at times almost everyone on the sidewalk will have a smartphone or some kind of camera pointed at the little trains as they roll past. I’m talking about the kind of cable car that runs on tracks pulled by a cable under the street, (not the kind that hangs below a cable). These are a picturesque bit of 19th century technology still working away in the 21st century. But, for all the attention they receive, I think they are actually under-appreciated as public transit and as technology.

For one thing they have the best “user interface” of any form of public transit. Subways and elevated systems force you to climb or descend, way out of your way, just to get to the boarding platform. All other forms of transit force you to funnel through doors that open and close at the command of someone else. With a cable car the greater part of the exterior of the car is open and you can just walk out into the street and climb on. You can even sit in the open air facing the street. While it is a little dangerous, you can run up and jump onto the car while it is moving -- they don’t move or accelerate too fast compared to a human being.

They are also remarkably efficient. A diesel bus has to carry around not just a diesel engine but also the fuel required to power that engine. An electric trolley or streetcar has to carry an electric motor (and often batteries as well). With cable cars the electric motors are located at the barn and all the individual car needs to carry is the “grip” to latch onto the cable those motors set in motion.

Today the cable car system is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, so only 19th century technology can be used on the cars, which I think is unfortunate. LED lights and modern reflectors would make them much safer to operate. I’m sure they could be improved in other ways if it were allowed. But at least they still operate, which is not something you can say for much of the transportation infrastructure from Ryecroft's time.

And that little bell serves them surprisingly well.

84 Charing Cross Road. 

If you like Henry Ryecroft, you should also like 84 Charing Cross Road.

Interlude.

I've managed to get ahead of the seasons so I'm now going to take a bit of a break from Ryecroft until some time in December. In this little interlude, I will move on to some other topics that haven't quite fit into the book to date, or that require a bit more space. No doubt Bataille and Foucault -- my most recent discoveries -- and Faust will be covered, but beyond that I really don't know.

Next: Interlude I. The Barbarian Kings.