Steam & Excursion > When These Locomotives Are Lined Up They May Still Be In Service!

This is a follow-up to my post yesterday about deadlines of steam locomotives often meaning those locomotives had been replaced by diesels, or simply that the host railroad was closing down for good.  Here is a different line-up of steam motive power that may mean something else.

This photo taken in the 1950's in the Bay Area shows a long line of Southern Pacific 4-6-2 steam locomotives.  This is likely not a line of locomotives that are being stricken from the roster because of the coming of diesels as those line-up were usually made up of a variety of SP steam motive power wheel arrangements.  This line-up is likely different.

The SP used these Pacific-type locomotives on the many commute trains that came and when out of San Francisco.  Since those are the only type of locomotives in this line-up, we may simply have some power held in waiting for the next rush of commute trains.  The engines are all complete and don't even have their cab windows closed.  This lead one to believe these are stand-by power and they are still in service.

Martin



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/29/20 03:26 by LoggerHogger.

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... and it looks like those train indicator boards are all ready to go.

John.

jkh2cpu Wrote:
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> ... and it looks like those train indicator
> boards are all ready to go.

... for 3 digit numbers, consistent with commute train numbers.

Arved Grass
Fleming Island, FL

Clean, glossy, and noting missing too.

"How about dropping by the railroad after Sunday Services dear?" he said, knowing he had stashed the camera in the trunk and that the kids might get a treat on the way home after....
A lot of roster shots are taken on weekends.

Probably all bumped from regular service by MT and GS locomotives, which were in turn bumped by diesels from long distance trains.

Stan Praisewater

That's the San Jose Roundhouse in the distance just beyond the end of the string.  The track they are sitting on is the same one SP would put the commute diesels on when they assembled them on Friday nights before sending them out to be weekend warriors. 

This looks like the typical morning lineup at the Lenzen Street roundhouse before the MT and GS engines took over.  I think you can see part of the roundhouse beyond the far end of the lineup, and the location of the gas tank in the distance matches the one by Cahill Street Station.

Note the P-7 that is second in line.  It makes an interesting comparison to the P-8's in front of and behind it.

Oops -- Wingomann beat me to it.

Edit #2 -- From the sun angle, the photo appears to have been taken in early afternoon, probably a Sunday.  Not many trains ran Sundays, and after the locomotives had completed their previous runs, they were serviced at the roundhouse, lined up and kept hot, ready to pick up their trains Monday morning.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/29/20 10:51 by Elesco.

Very interesting photo Martin, thanks for posting.

Nathan

Posted from iPhone

The large P-8 and P-10 Pacifics were the largest locomotives that could be turned on the 80' San Jose table.   The MT and GS classes, usually in groups, were turned on the nearby wye.    This added work to wye the larger classes maybe a reason why several Pacifics remained in commute service until the end of steam.  

As I recall the Los Gatos train wasn't
supposed to use 4-8-2s or 4-8-4s.