This week on Georgetown Time Machine, I’m taking a look at a photo from Georgetown’s transportation past. It comes again from the DC Historical Society and shows a streetcar exiting the massive car barn at M and 36th.
The photo record states that it was taken in 1949. In fact, the date from the record suggests that it was taken April 30, 1949. That would make this a more important historical record than it otherwise would be. That’s because that day is the last day that regular streetcar service used the car barn.
As I’ve written about before, the car barn was built in 1895 originally to serve four different streetcar companies. One of the companies that used it was a briefly lived cable-car-powered company called Capital Traction. That is why the facade has that name along with the image of a cable pulley:
The barn was primarily used by Capital Traction until its merger with Washington Railway and Electric Company to form the Capital Transit Company in 1933. Capital Transit continued to use the building, as much for office space as streetcar storage. But with the end of the Rosslyn-to-Benning line on April 230, 1949, the barn ceased to be used for regular service. The photo purports to be from that day.
The car barn continued to be used by Capital Transit to store streetcars until 1950.
The Georgetown Metropolitan 
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