SP at Colton Crossing New Years Day 1987
Vložit
- čas přidán 12. 09. 2024
- Jan. 1, 1987: A couple of EB SP trains w/ tunnel motors followed by a West Colton crew which brings a hump set (2 SD38-2s and an SD7) to the transfer yard but then cancels the move.
I wish I could go back to the 80's and the years of SP!
Thanks for the comment.
Another excellent video and a nostalgic return to my youth at 7:48 those things are MD 80 wings going to the McDonald Douglas plant in Long Beach where I &used to work
I knew they looked like wings but had no idea what they were for. Thanks for the info and the comment.
Gotta love the bay window cabooses, and the SD9s with the huge headlight rig, which only Southern Pacific had.
My father worked for Southern Pacific from out of Vietnam until he retired from up 10 yrs ago .His job sometimes on the Oregon coast was to race in front of the train and close 3 trestles or drive out let them across and race back to the depot .I got to go on many rides on the cabooses or the lead engine the first time I got to.was 83 and the last year was 89 I loved it .80+ mile runes up.the central Oregon coqst
Ah! SP at its finest and cleanliness. But really, a great catch. Nice!
I'm glad that you enjoyed it. Thanks for the comment.
Great video. looks a bit foggy there. When I got my drivers license in 1977, I took a road trip to Colton. Great times--lots of action at the yard and at the crossing. Never was bothered by SP bulls or gang bangers like today . Hard to believe that was over 40 years ago!
Paul Noble
You brought back vivid memories Paul. I lived in the area back in the day and my girlfriend and I would casually drive into the yard and kickback in the bed of my Subaru Brat with a beer, and watch 'em sort cars on the downgrade. If I had only known how fleeting those times were; entering a yard without any blowback, or having a girlfriend that liked to do this!😂
Some of those classic SP insulated boxcars are still around today. I saw at least two one by SP and one by Cotton Belt on a Union Pacific "salad shooter" in Geneva two months ago.
Thanks for the comment.
I saw some PFE mechanical refrigerator cars. I heard their diesel engines running, maintaining cold temperatures inside the cars.
The greatest days of SP!!!
Thanks for the comments. You have many kindred spirits among these comments.
Have ypu ever been in Mexico?
Mexico City and Orizaba in 1973; saw some trains but didn't ride any.
You can say that again! 😀😀
At 00:30, you have to admit ... that SP grey sure hides the grime well!
I'd almost be willing to bet there's a locomotive under all that dirt.
The thing about SP's grey is that unless the units were just out of the paint shop and super glossy clean or super dirty they just looked dull. It is odd that people don't comment on an older painted SF or UP unit that has lost its shine and claim that it is dirty or worse yet that the railroad doesn't take care of their equipment. Not that SP units weren't dirty because many of them were, but quite often they were just dull from age. Many of them were no cleaner or dirtier than those of other railroads. I have a Pentrex video from the this era and it actually shows a line of SP diesels going through the wash at Roseville including a faded dull SPSF merger unit. It comes out wet but still looked dirty.
I really enjoyed this old footage thanks for posting! I was about 5 when this was filmed, my how the railroads have changed! There’s something about those SP emd’s especially that SD9 nice catch!
And I’ve never seen an entire train of the twin stack cars that was cool! I didn’t know Sea Land ran unit trains back in the day.
Nick
Thanks for the comment. SP 1506 is actually a rare SD7 with two fuel tanks. SeaLand/NYSW was a pioneer of solid double-stack trains of maritime containers. This video shows an earlier one with a caboose: czcams.com/video/lAu8g1IE9Oo/video.html
vidwilzvids Hey I just saw your reply a year later sorry! Wow thanks for the Info I assumed it was a sd9 but I think all the other ones I’ve seen have had the one small fuel tank. And that video you sent me was a treat I’m a CSX man and remember seeing the chessie cats when I was a kid☺️. Surprisingly quite a few of the twin stack sets are still in operation they are definitely the most unique looking intermodal cars ever built lol
Actually SP was the first Railroad to court steamship companies for their containers. SP also helped create the first double-stack car. And ran the first stack train. Because they can carry as many containers as a ship can, stack trains are practically land ships.
@@markschroeder2578 Stack trains can only carry as many containers as a very small ship. Even 150 fully loaded 53ft double-stacks is only 800TEU (i.e., the equivalent of 800 20-foot containers). A small container ship would be 2000-3000TEU, and the really large ones are 18000-25000TEU.
I can remember way back in the late 60's early 70's the Southern Pacific had a local that ran from Colton to Pomona (industry spur) they always ran SW 1200 & 1500 switchers through Upland and serviced Upland feed and fuel and Sunkist citrus packing. I was always listening for the Banjo signals and train whistle as it putted through town between Arrow Hwy and 9th Street parallel with Washington Blvd.
Great video 👍 thanks for sharing.
Thank You for the informative comment.
By banjo signals I'm guessing you mean wig-wags at grade crossings. The FRA banned them from new installations and called for their replacement with flashers and gates. Two wig-wags from the Ellis Bear St. crossing are preserved at the Texas Transportation Museum on Wetmore Road on the north side of San Antonio TX, at the intersection of Wurzbach Parkway and Wetmore.
I know that area well myself. I only recall seeing an SW through Upland on one occasion (but I was a kid in the 80s and mostly hung around the AT&SF (and Amtrak) tracks closer to 8th Street.
In fact, when my family bought our first house in 1991 it was directly north of the Southern Pacific line and it was a selling point for me--and they literally never ran another train on that line again. *heavy sigh*
@@FreihEitner That's interesting, well, if you are familiar with Upland, I lived in the house with all of the massive Ham Radio antenna's, do you recall where that's at?.
Fallen flags and a 4 track diamond that no longer exists. Things have changed at Colton.
I live near a part of former SP track that was separated from the mainline, and I wish I could go back in time and see the Southern Pacific trains rolling through the crossings
More...Excellent Footage!
Cotton Belt tunnel motors with the see-through grills... awesome...
Never knew that Southern Pacific had SD38-2 engines just like the EJ&E!
Those SD38-2's were built specifically for the Colton hump. Thanks for the comments.
The SD38-2s were referred to as crest engines because the hump was called the crest in SP parlance. When they were new, they worked with slugs cut down from 2 Alco C628s and 1 C630. They worked in pairs sandwiching a slug. I have a video copy of a West Colton Yard promotional film, from where this information comes from. The slugs were retired years ago.
They only owned 6 SD38-2's (2970-2975) and all of those units were converted into slugs after the Union Pacific merge and actually remain on the roster today for local and yard switching only,always coupled to an SD40N. At one point Southern Pacific was considering on relocating the units along with the SD35's and SD39's to Texas for rock train service primarily between Houston and Austin. There were sections of trackage at the time between locations which only had 96 pound rail and couldn't handle the weight of SD40's,SD40T-2's,SD45R's,or SD45T-2's but those three specific units were lighter enough to work with. At the last minute they made changes about business and shutting down trackage out there so the plan never happened. The SD38-2's remained at West Colton,few of the SD35's were in Englewood Texas for awhile,and the SD39's also were used in yards or being assigned as helper units because of better efficiency and cooling capacity in California when originally they were in Texas.
Back in the good ol' days when Southern Pacific and DRGW were two separate entities and notably not suffering from the form of jaundice that they have been for almost three decades. (Even better if there had been no mergers or reorganizations post-1953, but at least there were more than six Class Ones to choose from).
SMOG! I don't miss that!
Amen.
Special SD 35s...now i seen them...i love colton...but everything is gone...special products.. sp ...gone forever...
The 2973 & 2976 were actually SD38-2's built specifically for the Colton hump. Thanks for the comment.
This was awesome.
That’s the way it was done! Thanks!
Thanks for the comment. The 2973 & 2976 were two of the six SD38-2s designed and built specifically for the West Colton hump in 1973.
Awesome and rare footage of those the hump set. Do you have any idea why the transfer moves was canceled? Thanks.
Esos trenes ni están ya disponibles en la actualidad
That stacker on Southern Pacific must have come from Houston, TX
All new stuff back in 87 solid Sea Land cars. Not one TTX! WOW! ICTF was brand new! Guys made a lot of money back then taking trains to ICTF. I believe it was "off assignment" or a "new day" to take trains across the PE into the SP yard. That's wht the Basin "flat rate" was made.
Very nice video
Thanks for the comments.
Why were the early double-stack cars so massively over-engineered?
The days when the rolling stock wasn’t spoiled by graffiti .
I probably know these now retired guys. I work out of Colton. Yuma pool was high seniority in the late 80s
A friend recognized the guy in the Union jacket,but i don'remember the name.
@@vidwilzvids9587 the Switch man at old Colton looked like (Young) Rich Acuna still working as a Header. Old man now.
That day they were working the hump job off the extra board.
Why didn't you like the amtrak?
I think I said "Oh, great" because we were expecting to catch the Desert Wind at the Santa Fe crossing a little later. I'm not sure but I think the Desert Wind had a schedule change that started that day (Jan. 1st).
So more like “Aw man” 🫤
Tunel.movers.and.whole.load.ofsea.land.contaners.awsome.cargo.the.more.the.better