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Anthony

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Anyone know if the SW Chief will continue to run as planned, despite the big fires around San Bernardino?
 
This is from Amtrak's Train Status Page:

Due to a service disruption, we are unable to provide estimated times of departure and arrival. Please call 1-800-USA-RAIL for more information.

Train 3 from BAR to LAX for today is listed:

Estimated arrival: 9 hours and 20 minutes late.

As of the last report at 4:20 AM, at Victorville, CA, it was running 11 minutes early.

No mention of bustitution.

There is also a fire in the Simi Valley area that is disrupting the Surfliner and Starlight operations.

The sky here in Santa Barbara is thick with smoke, but no flames are visible (yet)!

Apparently the service disruption mentioned is computer-related and not fire-related.
 
There is no rail traffic at all moving through the high desert or Cajon Pass. I-15 is closed from Main Street in Hesperia, to I-10 in Ontario. There is no traffic being allowed on I-15. People driving back from Las Vegas are being detoured on Highway 58 west to Mojave, then south on I-14 down to L.A. I think tonights east bound Chief from LAX isn't going at this point. Amtraks website say's tonight's eastbound Chief departure is "sold out" I think that means service is questionable.

Wb
 
Also heard on Fox News Channel that LAX and SAN are closed with all air traffic being diverted. What a mess for all modes of transportation.
 
I drove down I-15 through Cajon Pass yesterday when it was still open. The smoke was so thick in at noon, it was like dusk. The headlights on my car came on automatically as they do when darkness is senced. It is a real mess. The wind here in Hesperia is moderate, which equates to high winds as the compression and heating occurs when the winds flows through the passes to the L.A. basin below. As a life long native of Southern California, brush fires are quite common in the fall. However, I have never witnessed anything like this before. The seasonal winter rains will be the next disaster when the mud flows start now that the earth is stripped of any ground cover. If there is any good news from So. Cal, we did get rid of the governor!!
 
Here's the scoop... all Surfliners north of LA are not running. The SW Chief is running tonight on time out of LA (I'm at Union Station awaiting its departure). It will be re-routed through Palmdale and Lancaster to avoid the fire. Train 3 was badly delayed.
 
While I don't know for sure if they're using those specific tracks, I bet you're right. The agent on the phone did mention Palmdale, Lancaster, and Mojave when explaining the re-routing. Is that particularly a bad thing? (I don't know either way)

thanks,
 
No, not a bad thing. Just interesting routing as that line up to Mojave has not seen real long haul passenger traffic since S.P. ran service through Mojave, to Bakersfield via the Tehachapi loop. My guess is when the Chief gets to Mojave, rather than go up hill to Tehachapi, your train will go east to Barstow and connect with the mainline to Needles. The line from Mojave to Barstow is a heavy freight line that runs behind Edwards AFB. Have fun and give us a report on this part of your trip.

Wb
 
warbonnet said:
If there is any good news from So. Cal, we did get rid of the governor!!
Click to expand...
That's also good news from us up here in Sacramento.
 
Will do - I'm only going as far as Needles so I'm sure you're right, they will probably connect at Barstow. Good thing I'm not flying or else I may not have gotten out tonight!
 
Anthony,

You are in for a very special train ride tonight.

The LA-Lancaster segment via Metrolink trackage should be totally uneventful. The Lancaster-Mojave segment (now UP) hasn't seen regular passenger service since the pre-Amtrak SP Los Angeles-Oakland trains.

From Mojave to Barstow, the train will travel the former ATSF (now BNSF) San Francisco Chief route.

Try to pay attention to the various crew changes between LA and Barstow.

This will make for an excellent trip report. Keep us posted.
 
They most definetley have to get a couple of pilots on board to get the train over the road. Anyone know how much that will knock the Chief down by with going over that route.
 
The LA-Lancaster portion of the trip should go rather quickly. Considering there are no intermediate stops, it should take no more than 1 1/2 hours.

The rest of the trip is anyone's guess. The UP and BNSF portions of this trip have very heavy freight traffic. A detoured Amtrak train can run up a bunch of delays in these areas.
 
There is no direct lead between LA-Mojave and Barstow-Mojave. They either wye the entire train in Mojave or run the power around the train. Tonight's train out of LA had baggage on the rear, indicating a power runaround at Mojave. This is not "new" - they did it a few months ago during another disruption.
 
The bottom line is Anthony is on this train.

Either the train will be wyed at Mojave, or there will be a power run-around.

It's not that this was the first time this has ever happened.

With Anthony on board this train, we can be assured of being informed of all the details of this most unusual routing of the SW Chief!
 
I will get some notes written here tonight. I'm a bit tired as I didn't sleep much... hopefully someone will be able to piece together my rough notes later and figure out exactly what they did.
 
Well, let's see...

We pulled out of LAX track 12 at 6:50pm... did not hook any freight cars to the back, at least not while I was on board. Usually they will kill the power and attach them but this time we just left right away. Took the Metrolink tracks to Lancaster with no passenger stops... then headed into Palmdale at around 8:50. We then headed over to Mojave and sat in the UP yard for an hour or so with the power off for the last 45-50 minutes... then headed out in the "right direction" (LA to Mojave the seats in the coaches were facing backwards but in Mojave we left going "forward"). Left Mojave around 11pm, having arrived around 10 or so. Entered Barstow yard at 12:05am after crossing the "Mojave River" over one of the narrowest bridges I've seen. (I was standing at the back coach looking out the back door window for a good portion of Mojave - Barstow... we paralleled the highway for quite a distance). Pulled into the Barstow depot at 12:20am.

From there it was the standard fare to Needles, arriving just after 3am with no sleeper folks to deboard.

I might note that it looked like they pieced together the trainset from what they had at LA since there was no way they could have turned around #3. Surprising to see a Super II lounge and diner on the Chief. The last coach had 2114 set in the car number display so I guess it came in that morning.

For those of you interested in consists... here's what I wrote down at Needles during its ~10 minute stop. (Looked like the conductor was assisting a passenger in carrying some large bags over to the parking lot)

500

191

--

1222 bag

--

39003 dorm

32110

32075

--

38039 diner

33040 lounge

31590

34088

34016

--
 
I will add that since we didn't make any stops between LA and Barstow, I have no idea what they did with passengers getting on or off at interim stops. There wasn't any sort of announcement at LAX about it so it may have been dealt with on a case-by-case basis... just a hunch. I got my Ventura - LA ticket refunded at the LAX ticket window as nothing was going north... they counted it as a "hardship exception".
 
Then the rumors of a possible power run around was correct as it was stated the baggage was on the back end of the train when it left LA but on the front at Needles. They had to piece that consist together with what they had in the yard seein gthe 500 on there, but then again the starlate has had some interesting power over the past week with the 456 and the CDTX 2014.
 
I always love seing the DASH8's leading trains. I think they look really good pulling at the head end. Now if we could just get three on the head end of Auto Train. :rolleyes:
 
Another problem: I wonder how many people did have plans and/or reservations to travel on the Starlight, Chief, and other trains, but who now can't because their homes are gone and/or threatened and other problems relating to the fires.
 
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