OAKLAND, Calif. — Amtrak will resume operation of the Coast Starlight over its full Seattle-Los Angeles route, beginning with departures from both endpoints on Monday, Aug. 23, following completion of bridge work between Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo, Calif. However, the train’s sleeping-car inventory currently remains limited for more than a month after its […]
LOS ANGELES — Metrolink will expand its recently introduced Saturday service on its Ventura County line, extending its single round trip to serve the Camarillo, Oxnard, and Ventura-East stations as of this Saturday, Aug. 14. The service was introduced May 29 and only extended as far as Moorpark, while also serving Simi Valley, Chatsworth, Northridge, […]
LOS ANGELES — More than three and a half years of labor-intensive work by the volunteers of the San Bernardino Railroad Historical Society was rewarded Aug. 7 as Santa Fe No. 3751 had a fire lit inside of it for the first time since December 2017. The event on a warm summer day in downtown […]
Independent analyst Anthony B. Hatch is fond of saying that one of freight railroads’ enduring advantages is owning and maintaining their own infrastructure. Nothing could drive that point home better than the repair blitz that Union Pacific launched after its 1,200-foot Dry Canyon Bridge sustained heavy damage from a wildfire. The 150-foot-tall span in Hotlum, […]
All through August 2021, Classic Trains editors are celebrating the history and legacy of the Western Pacific Railroad. In this article, please enjoy a photo gallery of Western Pacific Railroad passenger trains in their prime. This gallery was first published in July 2016. Only from Classic Trains! […]
Menards Santa Fe O gauge locomotive program is underway. Asking some 200 people to take a chance on this new product is bold. To request they test it on their layouts and report what the maker got right — and more importantly, wrong — takes even more guts. It is something I’ve never heard of […]
OAKLAND, Calif. — Amtrak says it is “actively working” with Union Pacific on a plan to restore service on the full Coast Starlight route between Los Angeles and Seattle, but does not yet have a date when that will occur. Service has been disrupted since UP’s 1,200-foot Dry Canyon Bridge was damaged June 28 by […]
Shasta Daylight The Oakland-bound Shasta Daylight rumbles over the big, curved trestle at Redding, Calif., in mid-1950. The Shasta was diesel-powered from its July 1949 launch. James L. Martin photo […]
WEED, Calif. — Union Pacific has reopened the Dry Canyon Bridge a month ahead of its original estimate, allowing the railroad to resume operations on its I-5 Corridor line between California and the Pacific Northwest. The railroad initially estimated the bridge would not be completed until Sept. 1, but last week said it could be […]
SAN JOSE, Calif. — With a date still to be determined for the restoration of light rail service, the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority is resuming alternative bus service along the light rail line as of today (Monday, Aug. 2). In a press release, the VTA said buses will operate at 30-minute intervals weekdays from […]
Rolling fortress With two big engines leading a dozen heavyweight cars into the desert, the Southern Pacific’s Sunset Limited looks like a rolling fortress at Palm Springs, Calif., sometime in the mid-1940s. Walter H. Thrall Jr. photo […]
Western Pacific Railroad history The Western Pacific Railroad almost “had it all.” It ran passenger and freight trains, in mountain and desert scenery, behind vintage steam engines that survived World War II and hauled excursions, and then colorful diesels, from early green-and-yellow FTs through orange-and-silver Fs and Geeps to dark-green second-generation EMDs and GEs. It […]
