Western Railroad Discussion > UP Newark vs. Warm Springs

In revisiting a recent project in Union City, I took a look at Google Maps and starting searching around for all of the sidings on UP from Elmhurst south on both the lines through Newark and Niles, all the way to Gilroy, and up the Penninsula. The amount of railcars on sidings is very small.  And considering that most cars sit on a siding for a few days to several weeks (ie: tanks and covered hoppers), it seems that the daily count handled in locals is very small. Does anyone know how many cars are handled by the locals daily out of Newark and Warm Springs? If what I'm seeing on Maps is accurate, why would UP need both of those yards? It almost seems that Newark, as small as it is, could handle all of those locals. The rock trains should be direct from Aromas to the unloading spots, with maybe the Graniterock facility off Berryessa being a drop-off at San Jose Yard (or what's left of it)? TIA for any info.

Bruce

There are no locals that go on duty in Newark.  The locals go on duty at Warm Springs.  The Newark yard is being used for car storage only.
Right now there is a bunch of center beams being stored in Newark.

StStephen Wrote:
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> Does anyone know how many
> cars are handled by the locals daily out of Newark
> and Warm Springs? If what I'm seeing on Maps is
> accurate, why would UP need both of those yards?
> It almost seems that Newark, as small as it is,
> could handle all of those locals.

That was true in 2016 and before. UP migrated all the Newark and Milpitas Yard functions to Warm Springs that year, and I had a chat with a manager about that just before it happened. We used to have MRVSJ/MNWRV and MRVMI/MMIRV pairs, which turned into MRVWS/MWSRV. Now it's handled by MRVOA --> MOAOA (Oakland - Warm Springs - Oakland) --> MOARV.

Warm Springs Yard by itself was busy handling outbound GM/Toyota autoracks before NUMMI shut down for good in 2010, as well as hosting BNSF's Warm Springs Local out of Richmond. Made sense to have Newark and Milpitas Yard do their own things back then. 
 

I used to see the local out of Warm Springs heading up to Fremont, Union City, Newark, and out to Livermore with often just 5 or 6 cars.

A manager told me last week that Tesla is ramping up business in a huge way. I can't remember the number of railcars he said they're planning on shipping, but he did say that we should expect to see empty racks coming at Roseville from every direction. We're already running 10k'+ MRVOAs regularly. A lot of this traffic will have to be picked up by the mnpmi on its way through town.

I'm guessing that most of the outbound loads will be on dedicated trains.

billmeeker Wrote:
When I worked at Warm Springs as a weasel in 1977.  The only jobs that went on duty at WS were the jobs dedicated to GM.  At Newark the jobs that serviced Hayward . Belle Haven, the salt companies went on duty at Newark.  Times have changed.. 
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> I used to see the local out of Warm Springs
> heading up to Fremont, Union City, Newark, and out
> to Livermore with often just 5 or 6 cars.

StStephen Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> In revisiting a recent project in Union City, I
> took a look at Google Maps and starting searching
> around for all of the sidings on UP from Elmhurst
> south on both the lines through Newark and Niles,
> all the way to Gilroy, and up the Penninsula. The
> amount of railcars on sidings is very small.  And
> considering that most cars sit on a siding for a
> few days to several weeks (ie: tanks and covered
> hoppers), it seems that the daily count handled in
> locals is very small. Does anyone know how many
> cars are handled by the locals daily out of Newark
> and Warm Springs? If what I'm seeing on Maps is
> accurate, why would UP need both of those yards?
> It almost seems that Newark, as small as it is,
> could handle all of those locals. The rock trains
> should be direct from Aromas to the unloading
> spots, with maybe the Graniterock facility off
> Berryessa being a drop-off at San Jose Yard (or
> what's left of it)? TIA for any info.
>
> Bruce

It's pathetic and I don't know what I dislike more about living here. The high housing costs or the lack of any significant freight action around here to observe.

I live in Campbell now and there's a lumberyard I can almost throw a stone at that gets a centerbeam load every couple of weeks (it's on the Vasona/Cupertino branch). One local a week (if needed) will deliver a load or pick up an empty, never/seldom both so it's a one car local and a light pair of engines each way as the only traffic on this line, Yeah Lehigh Cement up in the Cupertino hills is supposedly "temporarily" shut for Covid, but even if it reopens it was a tiny once a week one or three car consist too. Pathetic.

Lathrop/Stockton/Escalon is a painful drive.

There are some good things about living here though. But from a railfanning and industry observation perspective I do miss my 35 years in Chicago. Or even my 2.5 in Omaha.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/16/21 00:55 by pbouzide.

rantoul Wrote:
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> ...The high housing costs or the lack of any
> significant freight action around here to
> observe....
>
> You may not realize, this can be said of many
> places in the US.

I do indeed. Take a look where San Jose and San Francisco generally rank in housing costs among US metros. Chicago's still quite expensive though.

As far as decent Class 1 line haul freight action, it's also hard to do much worse than the SF Bay Area. Boston is up there but Ayer or Worcester isn't THAT far. Austin, TX is a little meagre for its size. Miami too. Any I'm forgetting?

But living in the Bay Area does give you the Train Shop.