Those objections disappeared after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake . The quake and resulting fire destroyed the power houses and car barns of both the Cal Cable and the URR 's Powell Street lines , together with the 117 cable cars stored within them . The subsequent race to rebuild the city allowed the URR to replace most of its cable car lines with electric streetcar lines . At the same time the independent Geary Street line was replaced by a municipally owned electric streetcar line – the first line of the San Francisco Municipal Railway ( Muni )
1906 San Francisco earthquake
1906 San Francisco earthquake
San Francisco cable car system