Nostalgia & History > SP's East Pleasanton Turn in 1985

1. Southern Pacific #3778 leads the eastbound East Pleasanton Turn in Niles Canyon on January 27, 1985. SP arranged for trackage rights over the Union Pacific (ex-WP) Niles Canyon route as part of their effort to shed their own line over Altamont Pass and Niles Canyon. in this photo, the 3778 follows the same path as WP trains had years before the UP merger.

2. SP GP9R 3778 East and the East Pleasanton Turn at Hearst near Pleasanton on January 27, 1985. Hearst was one of the favorite locations to shoot WP trains during that railroad's heyday.

3. SP GP9R 3778 switches the Kaiser cement plant at East Pleasanton  on January 27, 1985.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/25/26 22:49 by rattenne.

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Where did the turn originate? Oakland? Nice photos, it was gone by the time I started exploring the area.

Nathan

Posted from iPhone

For years the train orginated at Bayshore and ran with empty hoppers to Redwood City, across the Dumbarton Bridge, through Niles Canyon and to East Pleasanton.
Departing there in the afternoon  loaded with cars full of gravel, the EPT, or also called Rock Train, made it's way back to Bayshore.
In the 1960s I attended high school right next to the tracks in Burlingame and saw the eastbound Rock Train pass through Burlingame during the lunch period.
Motive power was always interesting with Fs,Geeps,SD7s, KM's, and big Alco centuries.
Attached is a short video clip from 8mm film taken by the late Tom Hallendorf in early 1965, a portion of which shows the daily freight departures from a hill above Bayshore Yard.
The Rock Train has the two Fs A-B.
Regards, Jim Evans



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/26 21:49 by FiveChime.

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FiveChime Wrote:
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> The Rock Train has the two Fs A-B.
> Regards, Jim Evans

thanks Jim for the vid, awesome and sad at the same time. 

Thanks for the memories, Ken and Jim!

In the late 1970's EPT operated out of Bayshore and was my favorite train to work (2nd most: the Permanente). How could you not like a run that combined the Dumbarton Bridge and Niles Canyon? Darn scenic!

Power was just about anything the Bayshore roundhouse foreman had that was capable of moving, either singly, or in pairs. (later, when EPT ran out of San Jose, it sometimes had three SW1500's). Train length was highly variable in either direction, with anything from a few to 60+ loads out of East Pleasanton. There was a daytime switcher there that gathered cars from the Radum Branch and Livermore and pulled/weighed cars from the three local rock outfits. Supposedly all would be ready for EPT, but beans and spot time were always a greater priority for the switcher crew according to its conductor, who much later on was my regular Caltrain conductor for several years. This was way OK by me because WP's San Jose Turn with those wonderful F's would usually pass by while we were on spot.

There were two small yards end-to-end at East Pleasanton/Radum. One consisted of the front, middle and back tracks, while the other held #3, #2 and #1 tracks, with #1 being furthest from the main. The inside switches connecting the yards were "flip-flop" ground throws, which 'somewhat' resembled variable switches, but were rigid. I recall one day when the EP operator came rushing up to the engine as we arrive to alert us to this fact. Apparently an extra EPT the day before had treated them as variables and ran though them, resulting in scattered cars when it reversed direction. How they misidentified them I can't imagine unless they were drunk (not as rare as you might think).

In about 1979, the EP switcher was yanked, which meant that EPT did work on the branch. Kodak at the end of the branch and Camp Parks at Dougherty were the only active locations, I think. I also vaguely recall using two U33C's on the branch once. Occasionally, EPT also worked the steel mill at Livermore, in which case the crew might tie down the train on the main track there and go to beans. I'm thinking that the Oil Cans was the only through freight over Altamont by them. If EPT had no work except East Pleasanton, the crew typically had the work finished and headed west earlier than when the switcher was active. That Caltrain conducter was quite amused when I first mentioned this to him while hashing about old times.

All this is the long way of saying that I shot very few photos while working EPT, so it is great to see it figuratively in the flesh now that my memories are beginning to fade.

Regards, EO
Wx4.org

 

Also interesting to note that this was the original mainline from Sacramento to Oakland and then to the other locations as civilsation progressed.
t4p.

EO Wrote:
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>
> In about 1979, the EP switcher was yanked, which
> meant that EPT did work on the branch. Kodak at
> the end of the branch and Camp Parks at Dougherty
> were the only active locations, I think. I also
> vaguely recall using two U33C's on the branch
> once. Occasionally, EPT also worked the steel mill
> at Livermore, in which case the crew might tie
> down the train on the main track there and go to
> beans. I'm thinking that the Oil Cans was the only
> through freight over Altamont by them.

The last regularly scheduled freight over Altamont was the RVSJA, which usually traversed Altamont-Niles Canyon at night, but I saw it in the morning while hiking through Niles Canyon. On weekends it sometimes would run during the day, with returning commute power. I think it ended in 1979 or 1980.  Then the only other through train was the occasional unit cement train out of Mojave (MJOAL?). Completely random and must have been called off the extra board out of Tracy.

I don't ever recall the Cans running Altamont-Niles. If it did, it was likely a detour.

Gentleman, thank you for all the information - and the Video!!

At the time I was shooting the EPT in 1985, IIRC it was working out of Warm Springs Yard in Fremont. I shot it a lot once it moved over to using the former WP mainline to get to East Pleasanton. I also caught it a bunch prior to that when it was still all SP trackage. Favorite haunts were Santa Clara at the Agnew depot, Alviso (my absolute favorite) and in Santa Clara. 

My favorite local to chase was the Permanente'' Local as it ran through 'my backyard' so to speak. Living in west San Jose and Campbell at different times I would pick it up in Campbell and Chase it into Saratoga and occasionally all the way to the cement plant. What fun times those were.