San Francisco and San Mateo Electric Railway

The San Francisco and San Mateo Electric Railway (SF&SM) was the first electric streetcar company in San Francisco, California. The company was only in business for ten years, starting in 1892 until its merger into the United Railroads of San Francisco (URR).

Brothers Isaac and Fabian Joost were real-estate developers in the neighborhood of Sunnyside. They saw the success of Frank Julian Sprague's Richmond Union Passenger Railway in Richmond, Virginia, and determined that an electric streetcar system running through their then-isolated portion of the city would be a good way to boost property values. In 1890, the San Francisco & San Mateo Railway Co. was incorporated, and the railway opened for business on April 27, 1892. Two separate lines ran consecutively from the Ferry Building at the foot of Market Street to the Baden area of South San Francisco, with a transfer required at 30th Street & San Jose Avenue. The line did not actually extend to the city of San Mateo, which lays 13 miles (20.9 km) further to the south, although it did run through part of the County of San Mateo.

The route chosen by the company was rather unfortunate. After leaving the Ferry Building, the line went to 30th Street via Harrison, 14th Street, Guerrero and San Jose Avenue. They were not able to traverse any of the major streets, as rival streetcar companies already had lines on them. Furthermore, beyond 30th Street, the area of the city was not yet fully settled. With an unpopular route that led to sparsely populated neighborhoods, the company could not generate much revenue despite having nearly 4,200,000 riders annually. This trend continued after the merger into URR well into the 1920s, when electric streetcars were at their most profitable.

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