Built in 1901 by Colonel J. W. Eddy, lawyer, engineer, and friend of President Lincoln, Angel's Flight is said to be the world's shortest incorporated railway. The counterbalanced cars, controlled by cables, travel a 33 percent grade for 315 feet. It is estimated that Angel's Flight has carried more passengers per mile than any other railway in the world, over a hundred million in its first fifty years. This incline railway is a public utility operating under a franchise granted by the city of Los Angeles.