Steam & Excursion > This Was Once A Familiar Sight At This Central Part Of This Town!

While the steam servicing facilities in some cities were tucked away in relatively remote parts of town, that was not the case for the SP&S servicing facilities in Portland, Oregon.  They were located just a short distance from Union Station on Front Avenue near the center part of town.

Here we see a typical gathering of SP&S steam motive power gathered at these facilities being readied for their next runs either to Astoria and the Oregon Coast, or across the Columbia River and down the North Bank side to Wishram and then down the Oregon Trunk to Bend, or on to Pasco, Washington.

With this kind of accessibility, the steam parked at this servicing facility certainly got plenty of attention from the railfans of the day.

Martin



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/13/21 03:04 by LoggerHogger.

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Thank you, Martin.  ...and with Crown Flour almost always in the background of those many photos.

Any idea of when this photograph might have been taken?

Bob Willer
Flatlands

That's definitely a trip to the past.  Is that setup just a westward extension of the Union Station trackage complex, or part of the Hoyt Street Roundhouse facility?  The angle of the tracks to the background doesn't quite fit with the alignment of the roundhouse facility during the '60s and '70s as I remember it.

Great post.  Thanks, Martin.

Greg Stadter
Phoenix, AZ

E25 Wrote:
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> . . .  Is that setup just a westward extension of the Union Station
> trackage complex, or part of the Hoyt Street Roundhouse facility?


Greg, its part of the Hoyt Street Roundhouse facility.  The photo is taken in a generally northeastward direction toward the SP&S 363 which appears to be on Roundhouse #2 track headed toward the turntable.  The other visible tender is on Roundhouse #3 with another steamer visible over the top of it on Roundhouse #4.  There were five roundhouse tracks off the Roundhouse Lead from the Yard Office, with #5 being stub-ended near the turntable.  A fifth inbound connection to the turntable came directly from the Coach Yard.

Union Station is to the right (east), out of the picture.  In the attached map picture the red circle is the former location of the Hoyt Street Roundhouse at 1105 NW Ninth Avenue (the NW corner of Ninth and Lovejoy) where I began my SP&S employment on the first day of the last third of the twentieth century.  The 363 would be approximately at the map marker labeled "NW Northrup St & NW 10th Avenue" and the photographer was aiming in approximately the direction of the red arrow.

The Roundhouse Lead passed through the area labeled "The Fields Park" and continued in a northwesterly direction (paralleling the closer-to-Front Street Northern Pacific Terminal Company of Oregon tracks) toward the Hoyt Street Yard Office with the Depot Lead in between.

 



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/13/21 17:48 by Jim700.

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From the 1/24k Portland quadrangle, 1954 edition, surveyed 1951:

 

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Thanks Jim and Elesco for the additional information.

Greg Stadter
Phoenix, AZ