Western Railroad Discussion > Trains Galore (UP's Yuma Sub, SoCal)

The word "galore" reminds me of a scene from a spy movie, which I'll paraphrase to try to make it on topic:

Foamer: (waking up) "Who are you?"
Goddess: "My name is (train) galore."
Foamer: "I must be dreaming..."

It's my dedication to Sean Connery and Honor Blackman, both of whom passed away in 2020.

I headed to West Colton Yard this Sunday morning, and UP Dispatcher 250 was talking to ZCIG4 (City of Industry to Global4, Illinois). We sometimes talk about "train gods" or some form of deity that brings us luck... I'm hoping my deity is a Train Goddess?

Video starts with a 3 way meet at Pepper Ave., hump herder SD40-2s, a manifest shoving on the main, and ZCIG4 with KCS in the consist.

I employ a different chase tactic with Z trains - overtake then backtrack. I did it in Arizona past the Sonoran Desert via I-8 years ago, and I did it against the ZCIG4 past San Timoteo Canyon on I-10 this time.

Train Goddess brought me an EMD Tier4 leader (UP 3076) going west pulling 53' boxes at Beaumont as I was backtracking. I knew from morning scouting that there was an eastbound autorack empties out of the Los Angeles Sub (Mira Loma).

"UP Detector Milepost 558.0, Track 2..."

It was too soon for the ZCIG4, so I guessed correctly that it was the autorack empties. So I picked a spot to document the meet, between the autorack and UP 3076.

I wanted to be on the east side of the crossing along San Timoteo Canyon so I wouldn't get blocked if I needed to head east, so I picked a spot to document the UP 3076 (symbol unknown), a 3x1x0 stack train with all domestic (53') boxes. I didn't get a head-to-head meet, but ZCIG4 showed up as I was documenting the UP 3076-pulled westbound intermodal train. Vehicle on the foreground is my Ford Edge rental.

I finish the chase of the ZCIG4 by pacing the 4th unit, a KCS GEVO... and I get another meet, likely MTUWC (Tucson, AZ to West Colton).

- Later on, manifest that was shoving (UP 5397) on Main 2 departed east on Main 1.
- SD70M UP 5121 was in the consist, recent repaint with the flag.
- Video of ZCIG4 meeting various trains,

(more next... I did say galore)
 

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Since the Train Goddess was generous enough to give me an EMD Tier4 leader, I obliged by overtaking the UP 3076 via I-10 so I can document it in better light at Pepper Ave. (West Colton Yard) Note the Schneider 53' boxes, which was exclusively BNSF until recently.

And I get another meet with an eastbound manifest departing West Colton.

(more trains galore next)

 

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I'm calling this train (led by UP 6787) MTUWC, although it's a guess based on seeing doublestacks mixed in the train. Years ago, that guess would have a good chance of being correct, but with the constant changes by PSR, who knows these days?

This is the train that met the ZCIG4 near Beaumont above. Entire MTUWC is shown, and there's yet another meet, of another manifest train (destination Yuma Sub, but otherwise unknown) departing east out of West Colton Yard.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/23 21:02 by cchan006.

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Outstanding as always, you are the maestro of "meets!"

I caught the counterpart fo MTUWC, the MWCTU the next day (Monday), so I'll include it in this thread.

I tentatively planned to head to Tehachapi early Monday morning, but once the live webcams showed lack of snow, I abandoned the plan, and stayed in the West Colton area. Mondays are notoriously slow on Tehachapi, and I wanted more trains galore on the Yuma Sub.

I was motivated to chase this, because I have a liking to C4460AC (or C6044AC, or whatever), and the leader was such a unit, UP 7308. The repaint still looked good, but the melodic and melancholy-sounding K3HL horn sealed the deal.

FYI, UP 7308 always had the 4400 hp prime mover, and was not converted from 6000 hp.

I'm confident this was the MWCTU because radio chatter called it "the Tucson." I had a choice of slower but elevated angle, or faster but ground angle (shorter video length) for my 2nd location. UP Dispatcher 244 had signals on both mains lit green for eastbounds at Hinda, and I suspected a Z-train passing maneuver was about to take place... so I chose the elevated angle. However, the passing maneuver didn't take place until further east at Banning.

I'll post a separate thread for the Z-trains, 5 of them. Anyway, entire MWCTU is shown at the 2nd location (Centennial Memorial Bridge at Beaumont).

To end the chase of MWCTU, I documented a meet with a westbound stacker near Cabazon.

- MWCTU stopped at Banning (just passed by a Z train).
- CN pool power (train on the move).
- Video as described.

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Nice videos and meet sequences, Charles.  Also the h/t to Honor Blackman, an underrated actress, IMO.  And, that's a fine looking 7-5 in the previous post, too.
GK
 

After meeting the UP 8127, I hurried back west toward Beaumont to catch the Robertson Rock Train, which was getting ready to depart west while I was chasing the MWCTU. I decided to do this, since UP 8127, being a non-Z train seemed underpowered, and was climbing up Beaumont Hill painfully slow. I figured I could always turn around and catch this train.

UP Dispatcher 250 decided to run this train ahead of the Rock Train at Loma Linda. A "concerned citizen" had reported "burning wheels" while UP 8127 was descending Beaumont Hill, so DS 250 asked the Rock Train to do a rollby of the stack train at Loma Linda. DS 250 asked UP 8127 if there were any train handling problems ("nope"), no hotbox detectors were triggered, and good rollby by the Rock Train. It's common to see smoking brakes from trains descending Beaumont Hill, and that's what the "concerned citizen" probably saw.

I've been wanting to document trains crossing the Santa Ana River near Mt. Vernon. My plan was to catch the Rock Train there, but UP 8127 showed up first.

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Here's the last train in this report, the Robertson Rock Train from Monday.

Near the Morongo Casino in Cabazon is the loading facility of the Roberson Rock Train, which runs between there and Gardena (near LAX). For more details, see the link below fron 2008:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1747929

After chasing the MWCTU, meeting the UP 8127-led Long Beach stacker, and catching up to the Rock Train near Banning, I took a meal break, then headed into San Timoteo Canyon...

And ran into an eastbound coal train. Yet another meet, Coal vs. Rock.

My goal was to catch the Rock Train crossing the Santa Ana River, and Train Goddess gave me better lighting than the stack train. C44AC UP 7114 seems to have a K3HL horn also. Nice 2x2 consist of C44ACs with clean paint.

That's it for this report, but I'll be posting more Trains Galore later.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/10/23 07:18 by cchan006.

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cchan006 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The word "galore" reminds me of a scene from a spy
> movie, which I'll paraphrase to try to make it on
> topic:
>
> Foamer: (waking up) "Who are you?"
> Goddess: "My name is (train) galore."
> Foamer: "I must be dreaming..."

Well, that is better than waking up and seeing Jaws! Nice bunch of shots BTW...

JG



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/09/23 03:38 by jgilmore.

Nice Videos, Charles! Always nice to see the pool power in Socal and even better with snow capped mountains. 

Very nice Charles!
Looks like new horn use under Pepper Avenue as I never remember that before.
Regards, Jim Evans
 

Should be Robertson's Ready Mix.

You had a lot of fun, cool video!

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