Western Railroad Discussion > CA fans, need help ID'ing locations of these shots..

The day after Winterail 2011, I took a ride south of Stockton to the Lathrop area, where I encountered a maze of mainlines radiating in different directions. Shot a UP 8166, seen in Pic 1. I thought it was turning to head down the valley. But, later, processing my photos, I see its the same train. Originally I thought the pic #2 was a train leaving the Bay area, rolling through what I thought was the Livermore/Pleasanton area, crossing an ex-WP truss bridge it appears. This train was a total surprise, I just happened to be scouting locations, liked the bridge, and a train shows up. Cool. But, where am I? And now, I discover its the same train as in shot 1, which totally throws me off. Our next location was Sunol and then Niles in our scouting mission.

So, what and where are these shots? What happens at Lathrop?

appreciate the lowdown. easy to see why you CA fans like the Altamont Pass area. these were just grab shots, if a person has time to scout and locate themselves there sure is some nice spots.

chico
http://www.heartlandrails.com

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I'm actually thinking shot two is at Pleasanton.

chico

This is the MRVSJ (Manifest Roseville-San Jose) traveling to the Bay Area. It's journey is as follows:

- Westward departure out of Roseville yard on the Martinez Sub
- left turn at Elvas (SAC) to head "RR South"
- down the ex-SP Fresno Sub through Stockton
- left turn at Lathrop wye to head "RR South" for a quick 1/2 mile (just after your photo location #1 and still on the SP Fresno Sub)
- quick *tight* right turn at Hicks (old WP crossing)
- "RR West" on the ex-WP Oakland Sub via Tracy, Altamont Pass, Livermore, Pleasanton (photo location #2), Sunol, Niles Canyon
- "straight" across the diamonds at Niles JCT on to the Niles Sub
- "RR West" via Centerville Line through Fremont
- left turn at the Newark wye (Cherry)
- South on the Coast Sub to make it's scheduled Newark yard set-out
- South past Albrae, Alviso, Santa Clara
- and finally into San Jose (North San Jose or the ex-Newhall Yard next to the CalTrain main).

Five subdivisions traversed over and exactly 143.0 rail miles traveled, RV-SJ (not counting Newark set-out reverse moves). Got all that?

;)



Photo location #1:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=7th+St&daddr=&hl=en&geocode=FXgrQQIdxnvF-A&mra=ls&sll=37.824497,-121.276789&sspn=0.025119,0.035405&ie=UTF8&ll=37.824218,-121.273334&spn=0.00628,0.008851&t=h&z=17

Photo location #2:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=St+John+St&daddr=&hl=en&geocode=FVS2PgIdAk68-A&mra=ls&sll=37.66468,-121.876606&sspn=0.006293,0.008851&ie=UTF8&ll=37.664763,-121.876643&spn=0.00445,0.004426&t=h&z=18



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/20/11 06:48 by espeeboy.

A rough map of Lathrop was posted on the Passenger board last month, since the detouring Amtrak Coast Starlights
had to go from eastbound on the Oakland Sub (former Western Pacific) to southbound on the Fresno Sub (former SP
San Joaquin Division) and there is no connecting track for that routing.

The map is labeled for the moves that Amtrak made; for your question here,
your train was routed via numbers 6, 7 and 1 (ignore the direction of the arrows,
those numbers show your route).

Map is at:
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/attachments/fullsize/528000/scan0001_0001.jpg



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/20/11 07:29 by GenePoon.

shot two i believe is just west of santa rita rd. approaching the fairgrounds in pleasanton.

thanks everyone for the help, much appreciated.

another post forthcoming regarding where the Godfather and I were after we visited the Niles Canyon RR and Niles depot.

chico
http://www.heartlandrails.com