Nostalgia & History > Memories of SP's "Oakland Pier" ...

I wanted to share a handful of special photos regarding the Southern Pacific "Oakland Pier" transcontinental terminal in Oakland, CA in anticipation of the 130th Anniversary of its opening, on January 22, 2012.
I just recently completed my in-depth story about the famous "Oakland Mole". It runs about eight pages, single-space typewritten. A lot of historic information, including the overall size and dimensions of the structures and who designed it.
Ferryboat operation and maintenance is covered in depth, including details regarding the cleaning of urinals and the persons responsible. No stone is left unturned !
Some fifty photographs have been identified to help tell the story. I hope to run it on here sometime, space permitting. In the meantime, take a look back at this quick sample !

KRK

Photo 1. A sweeping fiew of the "Oakland Mole". Note the garden strip in the lower left corner of photo, leading towards Oakland Pier Interlocking Tower.
Note also, the long strings of electric suburban cars of SP's OA&B Lines, later to become the Interurban Electric Railroad. (IER)

Photo 2. A 1949 close-up view of the "Mole", courtesy of John Harder. Taken from atop Albers Mill. Note the Key System buses laying over before starting their runs to downtown Oakland. The small building with a peak roof and tall black smokestack, just to the immediate left of the water tanks, was the Pumphouse. A very important structure in the life of the Mole and West Oakland Yard. The larger building to the left, just before entering the Great Sheds, was the Bakery... Home to the famous "Raisin Bread" and many other tasty treats.

Photo 3. The scene that greeted passengers from San Francisco for so many, many years.
In 1929, the official Southern Pacific "Sunset" logo, some ten feet in diameter and made entirely out of stained glass, was placed high up on the westerly end of the big train shed, overlooking Passenger Slip No.4 . The pieces of stained glass were held together by strips of lead. When the Mole was demolished in the 1964-66 period, the logo was very carefully removed and stored for preservation. Today you can see this beautiful memento from the Oakland Mole at the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento. It is preserved and displayed in the original framework.

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Photo 4. Oakland Pier Interlocking Tower. Seen watching over WP's "California Zephyr".
Photo courtesy of John Illman.
This Tower was an extremely busy place. In the 1920 time period for example:

The average number of switching movements made in Oakland Pier Tower was 1,900 and under emergency conditions would run as high as 2,100 . From seventy-nine to eighty-three switching movements an hour, or over one a minute, qualified Oakland Pier as one of the busiest terminals in the United States.

Oakland Pier Interlocking plant was equipped with a 155-lever Union Switch and Signal Company electric pneumatic machine, in charge of a supervising towerman, two chief towerman and six levermen. Three men were on duty from 6 AM to 10 PM and two men from 10 PM to 6 AM. On August 26, 1920 a total of 2,177 switching movements were made by this plant, a record equalled by a few similarly located layouts in the United States. Traffic was so intense, special instructions provided that when a siren sounded on Oakland Pier Tower, all engines and trains within the district controlled by the tower were to stop and await a proper signal.

Photo 5. It is now the year 1990 in this photo courtesy of Dan Furtado. The MOLE has been gone for twenty-five years, but a lonely Tower still stands guard over the historic site. Waiting for the trains that will never come !

Photo 6. Oakland Pier Interlocking Tower as it looks today. Preserved for generations in the future to see, in the Port of Oakland's "Port View Park", foot of Seventh Street in West Oakland, not very far from where the old girl once stood, guarding her trains twenty-four hours a day.

Only a small number of mementos are left from "Oakland Pier" ... The Tower, the stained-glass SUNSET window that hung over ferry slip # 4, the Station Master's shack, and the famous clock.. Everything else is gone, except for wonderful memories !!

Be watching for my article in the near future.

Cheers.

KRK



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/08/11 12:15 by KeyRouteKen.

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Wonderful old images, Ken; this sounds like a fine piece you've written, perfect for "Railroad History" magazine. Cheers! Kurt.

I better find the time and read your article Ken. I'm sure it's a good one.

Tony J.

KeyRouteKen Wrote:
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>
> Be watching for my article in the near future.
>
> Cheers.
>
> KRK

In what publication will your article be published?

Thanks for sharing. Those are the first aerial photos I've seen of Oakland Pier.

TonyJ Wrote:
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> I better find the time and read your article Ken.
> I'm sure it's a good one.
>
> Tony J.

Yeah, like maybe tonight, huh ? I've been dying for your personal critique on the story, Tony. How 'bout it ??

KRK

KeyRouteKen Wrote:
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> Photo 6. Oakland Pier Interlocking Tower as it
> looks today. Preserved for generations in the
> future to see, in the Port of Oakland's "Port View
> Park", foot of Seventh Street in West Oakland, not
> very far from where the old girl once stood,
> guarding her trains twenty-four hours a day.

I'm trying to figure out or guess where this building and the pier originally was, and possibly what it looked like. It looks like there has been a huge amount of fill in the bay around Oakland, and I don't know when that was done, though certainly a lot of it had to be for WW II or before. But the pier seems from the pictures to go back to at least the 1890s. Was the pier demolished so more bay could be filled in, or was it demolished just because it was old?

Is there any sort of period map that shows the pier?

BTW, was Oakland bayside basically swamp that got filled to make it useful? Or did they just decide they needed more room?

Use the photos in this link:
http://www.historicaerials.com/
to get an idea of what was filled and when.

BART's transbay tube runs under what was the Oakland Pier and as I recall the pier was demolished to accommodate BART construction. In addition, the Port of Oakland, expanded into the bay for their container ship berths. The pier served no purpose after the demise of the ferryboats and the switch to Greyhound buses to move rail passengers across the bay (to and from 16th Street).

At one time, filling the bay was all the rage and there was considerable filling. That was stopped with legislation and the BCDC and today bay fill is practically out of the question. SF Int'l Airport wanted to fill for expansion some years ago; idea dropped due to opposition.

Port of Oakland requires constant dredging to keep it functioning. Likewise with other parts of SF Bay including Richmond. Much of SF Bay is quite shallow with depths (MLLW) off Berkeley about 10 ft. Deepest part of the bay is at the Golden Gate with well over 300-ft. of depth.

Two high and two low tides affect the depth each day on the bay and its tributaries. Tidal extremes are greater in the southern part of the bay (Redwood City and beyond). Tides and vessel draft determine where and when you can move and tide books are in the pocket of every mariner. Along with the tides are currents: two floods and two ebbs daily. Currents can reach 6 knots in certain parts of the bay, especially during runoff with extreme ebbs. This movement of water scours the bottom for natural dredging.

Even in the days of SP ferryboats skippers had to compensate for set and drift when crossing the bay.


lwilton Wrote:
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> I'm trying to figure out or guess where this
> building and the pier originally was, and possibly
> what it looked like. It looks like there has been
> a huge amount of fill in the bay around Oakland,
> and I don't know when that was done, though
> certainly a lot of it had to be for WW II or
> before. But the pier seems from the pictures to go
> back to at least the 1890s. Was the pier
> demolished so more bay could be filled in, or was
> it demolished just because it was old?
>
> Is there any sort of period map that shows the
> pier?
>
> BTW, was Oakland bayside basically swamp that got
> filled to make it useful? Or did they just decide
> they needed more room?

It's interesting to see old photos of the original 16th st. station (a photo postcard comes up regularly on Ebay). The water nearly came right up to the tracks in, ironically, this area later called the "desert yard".

Mark



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/10/11 22:00 by mwbridgwater.