Western Railroad Discussion > UP 3057 (SD70ACe-T4) in SoCal

I caught this train west of West Colton Yard back in early December 2019.

I was hunting for trains within San Timoteo Canyon, when I heard a radio chatter from Dispatcher 250 talking to a UP 3057. I wasn't sure if the train was on the Alhambra Sub or the Mojave Sub, so I headed west to see if I can pinpoint the train.

As I drove past Mt. Vernon, I overheard UP 3057 talking about track breach protection, which meant someone in West Colton Yard was working adjacent to Main 2. Sure enough, I spotted the train past Pepper Ave., just coming down from the Palmdale Cutoff (Mojave Sub). There wasn't going to be a crew change at Cedar, and I guessed correctly that the train would beat me to a spot near Cedar, so I stayed on I-10 and headed to a Plan B location near CP Sierra.

This train should have been the AMIWC (Auto, Milpitas to West Colton), which no longer exists due to the ongoing PSR flip-flop with train symbols. The train was getting ready to shove into the yard from Sierra, so I wasn't able to document the entire train. Back half of the train consisted of loaded autoracks, with about a half dozen miscellaneous cars (tank cars, covered hoppers) at the very end.

I suspect the cement hoppers were picked up near Stockton? In any case, a quick way to bury the cars on the spot with concrete in case of a derailment, to keep the insurance companies happy. :-)

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Well, since it doesn't run on the coast anymore so those cement hoppers could have been picked up at either Monolith or Mojave.

PHall Wrote:
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> Well, since it doesn't run on the coast anymore so
> those cement hoppers could have been picked up at
> either Monolith or Mojave.

AMIWC often ran Central Valley, and I don't know if it ever got routed to Coast during its short PSR life. Either way, if the Mojave Flyer got PSR'd (eliminated), Monolith and Mojave would be possibilities.

I was thinking of the Stockton to Oro Grande cement train UP used to run. Maybe AMIWC was picking up the empties at Stockton to be interchanged to the West Colton/Barstow BNSF manifest?

Nice doumentation Charles! Can always count on a quality write up and well-lit video!

Nice work, Charles. Haven't seen one of those since I was in SoCal about a year ago in almost the same spot!

Anything for some variety!

Jim B