A Pacific Electric red car in the opening to Ace in the Hole?

On Saturday evening we watched the 1951 noir Ace in the Hole. Given the ongoing discussion here about Dark Passage, I was surprised to see a streetcar used in Ace's opening sequence. The movie starts with Kirk Douglas, as Chuck Tatum, nonchalantly sitting in the driver's seat of his car reading a newspaper while the car is being towed to a garage. We're then cut to a scene of a streetcar rolling by a Spanish colonial building, the offices of the Albuquerque Sun=Bulletin newspaper where Mr. Tatum is going to get a job as a reporter.

I thought, ok interesting, later I'll capture an image for a post, but as I looked at the scene in detail, the streetcar looked like a Pacific Electric red car. I'm no expert on either Albuquerque electric railways or the PE, but it seems unusual for what looks like PE red cars in PE livery to be in operation in New Mexico.

My guess is that this scene was shot somewhere in or around Los Angeles where the PE was still running. The cameraman is sneaky in that the shot starts low, near street level, where it's easy to see the car's paint job and markings, but pans up as the car rolls by to centre on the building's sign, thereby making positive identification of the car more-or-less impossible.

That is a PE car for reference. You can see a number of features similar to the film's car. My gut feeling is that it's a match, but I don't have strong proof.

I guess the moving streetcar, plus the upward camera pan, adds visual interest. I also suspect the use of an old streetcar, in a shot with an old building, is to suggest that life here in this corner of New Mexico is old, sleepy, and a bit out-of-date, which is in stark contrast to Chuck Tatum's style when he makes his entrance to that newspaper office. 

PE cars aside, the movie is excellent, and still seems relevant today. Here's the trailer.

[Update, 4:30pm, 25 Aug: Vince alerted me to this interesting post at Cocoposts. The writer thinks the scene was shot in Albuquerque, as streetcars were still running at that time. Although, I must admit the streetcar in question still seems quite similar to a PE red car. I need to do some investigation.]