City Hall exhibition draws from SFMTA photo archive to trace San Francisco transit evolution since 1903
A century of public transit, documented through photography
A new photo exhibition at San Francisco City Hall is presenting more than a century of the city’s transit history through images drawn from the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) Photo Archive. Titled Moving San Francisco: Views from the SFMTA Photo Archive 1903 - Now, the show opened January 15, 2026, and is scheduled to remain on view through June 18, 2026, on the building’s ground floor and in the North Light Court.
The exhibition brings together photographs taken between 1903 and 2025, using public transportation as a lens to portray how San Francisco’s streets, neighborhoods, and daily life have changed over time. The show’s scope spans the late Victorian era through the present day, charting shifts in vehicles and infrastructure—from cable cars to buses and Muni Metro trains—alongside the people who used and operated them.
What the archive represents
The exhibition is built from a collection maintained by the SFMTA Photography Department and Archive, whose roots extend more than 120 years through successive photographers working for San Francisco transit agencies. The archive contains more than 200,000 images focused on transportation in the city, making it one of the largest local photo collections organized around this theme.
The City Hall presentation represents a small selection from that larger body of work, emphasizing the role of transit not only as a transportation network but also as a record of civic development, street-level commerce, and neighborhood growth.
Events and public programming during the run
Organizers marked the opening with a public reception at City Hall on January 15, 2026, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Beyond the opening, additional programs are scheduled during the exhibition’s five-month run, including monthly gallery talks and a zine-making workshop connected to artists from the earlier Muni Raised Me project. Planned events also include transit-themed trivia and a panel discussion.
Dates: January 15 to June 18, 2026
Location: San Francisco City Hall, Ground Floor and North Light Court
Collection span: Photographs dated 1903–2025
Transit history as an urban history
By foregrounding vehicles, routes, and workaday street scenes, the exhibition frames transit as a continuous thread through defining periods of San Francisco’s modern history, including the city’s recovery after the 1906 earthquake and fire and more recent system expansions such as the opening of the Central Subway in 2023. The result is an account of how movement—of workers, residents, and visitors—has shaped the city’s physical and social landscape.
The exhibition presents transportation images as both operational records and snapshots of everyday life across changing eras.