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Pacific Electric Railway Company Substation No. 8
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Pacific Electric Railway Company Substation No. 8
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Location	2245 N. Lake Ave Altadena, California
Coordinates	34°11′04″N 118°07′55″W / 34.18444°N 118.13194°W / 34.18444; -118.13194
Architect	Pacific Electric Railway
NRHP reference No.	77000295
Added to NRHP	November 9, 1977

Pacific Electric Railway Company Substation No. 8, also known as the Altadena Substation, is a former traction substation in Altadena, California. It operated under the Pacific Electric Railway and served as the substation for Pasadena area lines.

History

The Pacific Electric traction substation was built in 1905. In addition to providing power to the PE lines, it also powered the Mount Lowe Railway. In 1941, when PE sold its Pasadena area lines to Pasadena City Lines, a subsidiary of National City Lines, the substation was included in the sale.

The Substation was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977 for its significance as a part of the Pacific Electric Railway. By 1999 it was being used as an office building. In 2016, the Pacific Southwest Mennonite Conference opened a thrift store in the building.

Substation

Electric interurban and trolley cars required 600 volts direct current to operate a car's Direct Current (DC) traction motors. The function of a "substation" was to convert very high voltage alternating current (AC) from a power generating plant (often miles away) for an AC to lower voltage DC conversion. The high voltage AC entered the substation, was dropped in level by a transformer, and the resulting lower voltage AC was then fed to a device called a rotary converter for the conversion to 600 volts DC. Substations existed on every trolley and interurban line in the United States and often still do for today's subway and light rail lines, although the very large and cumbersome rotary converter, as much as 8 feet (2.4 m) in diameter and rotating, has been replaced by solid state converters.

See also

• Pacific Electric Sub-Station No. 14
• Ivy Substation

References

1. "Pacific Electric Mount Lowe Line". Electric Railway Historical Association. Retrieved 2008-01-07.
2. "Pacific Electric Pasadena Local Lines". Electric Railway Historical Association. Retrieved 2008-01-07.
3. "California - Los Angeles County". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. Retrieved 2008-01-07.
4. Harrigan, John (August 1, 1999). "Mount Lowe Power". Echo Mtn. Echoes. Land-Sea Discovery Group. Retrieved 2008-01-07.
5. "Love is a Verb: Full Circle Thrift realizes a missional dream for Pacific Southwest Mennonite Conference". 15 November 2016.
6. Hilton, George W. (1952). The Electric Interurban Railways in the United States.

External links

• Marnell, Harry. "Pacific Electric In Altadena". Retrieved 2008-01-07. - includes maps and images of the Altadena Substation

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History	Strike of 1903 1919 streetcar strike General Motors streetcar conspiracy
Infrastructure	Stations Etiwanda Lynwood Pacific Electric Building Picover Subway Terminal Building Watts Yorba Linda Hill Street Tunnel Hollywood Subway Ivy Substation Pacific Electric Railroad Bridge Redlands Trolley Barn Substation No. 8 Sub-Station No. 14 West Santa Ana Branch
Predecessors	Los Angeles Inter-Urban Electric Railway Monrovia Rapid Transit Company Mount Lowe Railway Ontario and San Antonio Heights Railroad Company Pasadena and Pacific Santa Ana, Orange & Tustin Street Railway Los Angeles and Independence Railroad Los Angeles Pacific Railroad
Connecting services	Glendale and Montrose Railway Los Angeles Railway
Successors	LA Metro MTA RTD LACTC OCTA Omnitrans Waterfront Red Car
Legacy	Culver Boulevard Median Bike Path Red Car Trolley (Disneyland Resort) Waterfront Red Car (San Pedro) Who Framed Roger Rabbit

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• Altadena, California
• Buildings and structures in Pasadena, California
• Electrical substations
• History of Los Angeles County, California
• Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Los Angeles County, California
• Pacific Electric infrastructure
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