Western Railroad Discussion > Redondo Tower/Jct/Flyover

I know Redondo used to be a favorite hangout for local L.A. area railfans, though much has changed in 10 years, most noteably the construction of the Alameda Corridor including the flyover used by Amtrak and Metrolink trains. Since the area is a favorite of mine to hang out in for train pictures, I've gotten a decent little collection of what the area looks like now, though it'd be cool to see a few pictures along with a few memories or stories from back in the day if anyone cares to share.

Photo 1: Taken during my only 'visit' to the tower, there were several things of note about the structure. The first being that someone was living in the ground level of the tower, no doubt someone homeless. Also at the top of the landing, someone had broken into the tower and all interior was in display to see, including the switch machine. Fortunately, despite broken glass there was no other vandalism, the machine was good along with the rest of the interior, and fortunately I knew who to contact in order to get the top level secure again.

Photo 2: Always liked this shot of the tower's shadow against the passing stack train rolling into the trench.

Photo 3: I imagine this is a rather rare catch in getting a BNSF movement over the flyover. Both units had a string of empty spine cars in tow, probably for Hobart loading.

---

---

---

Photo 4: BNSF5037 has the majority of it's train still in the trench as it swings off the joint Alameda Corridor and onto BNSF rail. The truss bridge spans Washington Blvd.

Photo 5: This year's Metrolink Christmas Train passes through in an area that doesn't get much cheer. The area around Redondo is mostly warehouses, trucks, homeless and razor wire.

Photo 6: A silhouette of a SB/EB Metrolink train cruising over the flyover.

As mentioned earlier, if you have stories or photos of Redondo days gone past, please share! Not being intimately familiar with tower ops, were the tower operators decent with letting people hang around? When did it finally shut down for good?

Ted S-P

---

---

---

TedS-P Wrote:

> As mentioned earlier, if you have stories or
> photos of Redondo days gone past, please share!
> Not being intimately familiar with tower ops, were
> the tower operators decent with letting people
> hang around? When did it finally shut down for
> good?

According to this old thread, the tower stopped physically controlling switches and signals on July 6, 2001 and the last operator departed on July 9:

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,81595

Stockton Tower had a similar multi-day closure schedule when it shut down almost exactly ten years ago (January 12-16 1999). The signal department used the time to get all the new signals and switches activated and tested and the old stuff yanked before turning the plant over to the dispatcher. The operator didn't have much to do, but was there nonetheless if their advice was needed on the routine of operations and getting trains through the plant in an orderly fashion.

The operators and myself put a lot of work into restoring that interlocking machine, I wish somebody would save it before something bad happens (like a fire).



TCS - just a little bit of history

Good stuff Ted! I see you found the "hole in the fence" off of Washington you good search dog you.


TedS-P Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> though it'd be
> cool to see a few pictures along with a few
> memories or stories from back in the day if anyone
> cares to share.


"Paging Mr.Axy_Dent, paging Spatcher Axy_Dent. You are wanted in the Western Discussion Board."

Or you could click on over to some nice Nostalgia board threads from Mr. Axy_Dent...

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1810230
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1809877
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1809673
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1544964 (good Axy_dent Redondo story)
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1060272
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,996815
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,996468

~~~

espeeboy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Good stuff Ted! I see you found the "hole in the
> fence" off of Washington you good search dog you.
>
>
> TedS-P Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > though it'd be
> > cool to see a few pictures along with a few
> > memories or stories from back in the day if
> anyone
> > cares to share.
>
>
> "Paging Mr.Axy_Dent, paging Spatcher Axy_Dent. You
> are wanted in the Western Discussion Board."
>
> Or you could click on over to some nice Nostalgia
> board threads from Mr. Axy_Dent...
>
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,
> 1810230
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,
> 1809877
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,
> 1809673
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1
> 544964 (good Axy_dent Redondo story)
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1
> 060272
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,
> 996815
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,
> 996468
>
> ~~~

There is access via a gate over by where the harbor sub splits off, also you can get ROW access next to the Santa Fe ave bridge (Entrance to J yard).

I worked at Redondo Jct in 1975-76. In the almost 2 1/2 years I was there not one railfan ever came to the tower when I was working, of course third trick probably wasn't to good for photography.

The old head day operator and swing man were both off the NP in Washington. They had both hired out in the 50's and worked the same division but never knew each other until they arrived on the Santa Fe in Los Angeles. They would tell stories about working at stations with no road access in the mountains, they would be dropped off by train and stay a week or so.

The day guy always packed a lunch prepared by his wife. He would relieve me at 700 am and before I could get out the door he was eating his lunch. Sometime if he was telling a good story I would stay a while to listen and it was always funny because he would be eating, talking and food was spitting out of his mouth while he was talking.

One night I was reclining in the chair and hear a loud noise from the roundhouse. I stood up and looked but didn't see anything and set back down. A hour or so later I could hear some chatter on the radio about trouble at the roundhouse, so I stood up again and looked and there were all kinds of red lights over there. It seems an inebriated citizen had gotten lost and drove into the turntable pit. That was the noise I had heard earlier.

Was able to drive around down there for the first time last week while in town visiting the in-laws. Gritty, but lots of action. I wish I could have snapped a picture from the Olympic Blvd bridge where I saw a tank train moving west to east across the river and heading north along the river after making the curve. Just looked cool.

Nathan

My first visit to the tower was in 1995. It didn't look like a particularly good place to linger, but I brazenly drove down the access road anyway for two reasons - an active Santa Fe tower, and one of only two Santa Fe MK1200G's. ATSF 1200 had just come out of a small yard (called?) west of the tower, gone around the curve by the roundhouse fence, and was now heading south in the direction of Malabar.

---

Evan, the direction you are facing is more or less south in the photograph, with the track curving to the left being where all the San Diegans pivoted east to Fullerton?

That's always been the hard thing for me to discern in photographs of the plant are directions in which the tracks lie.

Ted S-P

Malabar is the small yard to the west (southerly) of Redondo Jct. Tower

Jim Baker

TedS-P Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Evan, the direction you are facing is more or less
> south in the photograph, with the track curving to
> the left being where all the San Diegans pivoted
> east to Fullerton?

Yes, Evan is facing south. The roundhouse stood about 200 feet behind him.

Evan's photo shows ATSF 1200 on the Harbor Sub which effectively formed a wye at the tower. If you look at various aerial images, you can clearly see where the tracks used to be.

http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&FORM=LMLTCC&cp=pp2p7v54f2jw&style=b&lvl=2&tilt=-90&dir=0&alt=-1000&scene=6994138&phx=0&phy=0&phscl=1&encType=1
(by the way, the truss bridge over Washington Blvd didn't use to be there)

I'm thinking Evan's "small yard west of the tower" might have been the big team track facility over that way. I don't remember what it's called - I'll have to look up a photo I have of it when I get home.

Either that or I'm as confused as the rest.

- Kit

Kit Courter
Menefee, CA
LunarLight Photography

CimaScrambler Wrote:

> I'm thinking Evan's "small yard west of the tower"
> might have been the big team track facility over
> that way. I don't remember what it's called -
> I'll have to look up a photo I have of it when I
> get home.

Yes, that's the one. The 1200 had just come east from that facility across Santa Fe Ave., around the curve by the roundhouse, and in the photo is heading south toward Malabar. For Ted, the track curving to the left is indeed the turn that took the San Diegans and SW Chief eastward toward Hobart and Fullerton, and the track running left to right across the frame is the SP, now the access to the Alameda Corridor. The track 1200 is occupying was pulled up by 1998, several years before the tower closed. It connected with the Santa Fe Harbor Sub about a half mile south of the tower.

About that team track facility - did Santa Fe have its own track parallel to the SP, did they use the SP, or was this an LAJ move?

I got an email of encouragement to tell another story about my time at Redondo Jct.

The second trick man had been around a few years longer than me, but was still a young guy. He brought a TV into the tower which we kept inside TCS' unrestored interlocking machine. It was a 15" or maybe a 17" with rabbit ears, which was pretty big for that time.

He would leave the TV out for me when I came to work and I would usually watch Carson and put it away unless the was something good on the Million Dollar Movie on channel 9. Then I would get down to the business of being comfortable.

One night an extra man was working on my night off and must have been pretty tired. He fell asleep with the TV on. Trains were calling on the radio and no one could raise him on the telephone. The Assistant Trainmaster came over from Hobart and pounded on the door but the guy didn't wake up. Fearing something bad, the ATM kicked in the door and woke the sleepy head up.

He confiscated the TV and the extra man got a short suspension. The second trick man and I talked about when the other shoe would drop for other possible offenders. After about a week the trainmaster called the tower and left a message that he was going to throw the TV in the trash unless the owner came to get it.

On his way to work the next day the second trick man stopped at the trainmasters office and picked up his TV. When I got to work that night it was back in it's old spot. He said he only got dirty looks from the trainmaster when he picked it up so he figured we were back in business.

The inside of the interlocking machine was supposed to be sealed, but Redondo wasn't. We would open the door pull out the TV then put it away and close the door and no body could see it inside the machine.

One week later around midnight I was watching Carson and heard a car door slam. I jumped up and saw the assistant trainmaster's car and someone coming up the stairs. I pulled the plug, pushed down the rabbit ears, grabbed the TV and carried it to the interlocking machine. I didn't have time to put the door back on the machine because by then the TM was at the tower door.

I let him in and he turned on the light, saw the TV sitting inside the machine with the door off and said something like "Holy crap, that TV is back here again." He asked me who it belonged to and I gave him my best "I don't know." How long has it been back in the tower? I don't know.
All the time I was hoping he wasn't going to take it away again because it was awfully hot, since it had only been turned off about 10 seconds.

Well, low and behold, he said to tell the person than owned it, that TV's weren't allowed on company property and they should take it home. Then he left and I never saw a trainmaster at Redondo Jct. again.

It took me a whole week before I was brave enough to watch Johnny Carson again. I am sure he knew I was watching it, the glow of the TV in a dark tower as he drove up the road from Washington Blvd. had to be obvious.

OliveHeights, great stories, thanks so much for sharing! Really do appreciate the time spent writing such engaging tales of life in the tower, very cool reading.

Ted S-P

Loved the game of cat and mouse... RR style! I think we all had some kind of game going on at some point in time!

Take Care, Stay Safe, Have Fun!

Larry

SPLoopConductor Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Loved the game of cat and mouse... RR style! I
> think we all had some kind of game going on at
> some point in time!
>
> Take Care, Stay Safe, Have Fun!
>
> Larry


Boy, IS THAT EVER THE TRUTH !!!!!

V

SLOCONDR

I believe Evan is talking about the old Auto Dock facility.

Look closely at the sign, it says Santa Fe Distribution Center.
http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&FORM=LMLTCC&cp=pp2s6p54db6q&style=b&lvl=2&tilt=-90&dir=0&alt=-1000&scene=33826034&phx=0&phy=0&phscl=1&encType=1