Tracking West
Davis Searchlights
With lighting being anything but cooperative for the entire chase, the last shot of the day made it all worth it.
The way this gypsum ended up on the West Valley was odd. The inbound loads had arrived very early Sunday morning, and was a last minute reroute. Originally, this train was supposed to go to the West Side Line out of Tracy, but at the last second for some reason it was rerouted to the West Valley, destined for Artois. Keep in mind, the two lines serve different customers, and not even my friend who was on the train knew what was going on with that. Although this train was around 140 cars, unloading it took very little time. It was almost fully unloaded in under 48 hours, but the crew unloading it ran out of hours with just six cars left to unload. On the day the train departed, the outbound crew would have to spend an hour getting the last of the cars unloaded.
The crew got on duty in Woodland at 04:30, then were driven up two hours to their train. The customer's crew in charge of unloading the remaining cars was supposed to arrive around the same time, however, a miscommunication had that crew showing up at 09:00. Once it hit 10, everything had been unloaded and the crew of the southbound backed their cut to the rest of the train. Due to the fact they still had to do an air test, the entire train would be pulled up to a spot where no crossings would be blocked. At 10:50, they departed south to hand it off to UP.
Although the crew was wasting no time getting the empties back to UP, the crew did run into a few delays. Just south of Willows, they would stop to flag a disabled crossing for County Road 57. Around twenty miles south of that at Maxwell, a speed restriction to 10 MPH was in place, not sure for what though. Only a couple miles later, the train would have to stop again at Cortena as the Cortena Job was setting out and picking up cars in the siding, using both tracks. After finishing up, the gypsum would move up to the south end of the siding, stopping for awhile. After that, the train would stop one more time in Davis.
When they got to Davis, two Capital Corridors would be lined before them on the UP. Since this train would be blocking almost every major route to get across town, and it was rush hour, they would be held at the furthest north crossing, 8th Street, before being able to move again. The UP crew was already waiting at the station, so once both Corridors had cleared they would walk over to the top of the wye. By the time the train reached 3rd Street, where the crew change happened, it was greens all the way into Sacramento for the gypsum. Swapping crews only took a couple minutes, with UP's crew getting the train out of there seemingly as soon as they sat down.
Of course since I was in Davis I had to shoot the train under the signal bridge. UP's Martinez Subdivision, which is the mainline through Davis, is almost entirely newer signals. While most of the signals are of course the modern Safetrans you see everywhere, some are older styles installed shortly after the SP's demise. Today, Davis is an oddball, still holding onto SP era searchlights. While I'm not sure what has kept these signals here for so long, it appears that for now the searchlights are not going anywhere. Hopefully, it stays that way for many years to come.
Hope you all have an amazing Christmas.
Davis Searchlights
With lighting being anything but cooperative for the entire chase, the last shot of the day made it all worth it.
The way this gypsum ended up on the West Valley was odd. The inbound loads had arrived very early Sunday morning, and was a last minute reroute. Originally, this train was supposed to go to the West Side Line out of Tracy, but at the last second for some reason it was rerouted to the West Valley, destined for Artois. Keep in mind, the two lines serve different customers, and not even my friend who was on the train knew what was going on with that. Although this train was around 140 cars, unloading it took very little time. It was almost fully unloaded in under 48 hours, but the crew unloading it ran out of hours with just six cars left to unload. On the day the train departed, the outbound crew would have to spend an hour getting the last of the cars unloaded.
The crew got on duty in Woodland at 04:30, then were driven up two hours to their train. The customer's crew in charge of unloading the remaining cars was supposed to arrive around the same time, however, a miscommunication had that crew showing up at 09:00. Once it hit 10, everything had been unloaded and the crew of the southbound backed their cut to the rest of the train. Due to the fact they still had to do an air test, the entire train would be pulled up to a spot where no crossings would be blocked. At 10:50, they departed south to hand it off to UP.
Although the crew was wasting no time getting the empties back to UP, the crew did run into a few delays. Just south of Willows, they would stop to flag a disabled crossing for County Road 57. Around twenty miles south of that at Maxwell, a speed restriction to 10 MPH was in place, not sure for what though. Only a couple miles later, the train would have to stop again at Cortena as the Cortena Job was setting out and picking up cars in the siding, using both tracks. After finishing up, the gypsum would move up to the south end of the siding, stopping for awhile. After that, the train would stop one more time in Davis.
When they got to Davis, two Capital Corridors would be lined before them on the UP. Since this train would be blocking almost every major route to get across town, and it was rush hour, they would be held at the furthest north crossing, 8th Street, before being able to move again. The UP crew was already waiting at the station, so once both Corridors had cleared they would walk over to the top of the wye. By the time the train reached 3rd Street, where the crew change happened, it was greens all the way into Sacramento for the gypsum. Swapping crews only took a couple minutes, with UP's crew getting the train out of there seemingly as soon as they sat down.
Of course since I was in Davis I had to shoot the train under the signal bridge. UP's Martinez Subdivision, which is the mainline through Davis, is almost entirely newer signals. While most of the signals are of course the modern Safetrans you see everywhere, some are older styles installed shortly after the SP's demise. Today, Davis is an oddball, still holding onto SP era searchlights. While I'm not sure what has kept these signals here for so long, it appears that for now the searchlights are not going anywhere. Hopefully, it stays that way for many years to come.
Hope you all have an amazing Christmas.