I understand that Oakland is the base in the BAy, and therefore makes it preferable to turn the train. But I feel like they could've gone the single hour further down to San Jose which is a pretty big stop?
By big stop I meant a lot of passengers, now everyone disembarking or boarding got screwed at San Jose. I think it would’ve been feasible to run the train down to San Jose (the engineer crew change is there anyway). Helps a lot of passengers and isn’t insanely hard to do.
Seems to me that if the train crew gets off in San Jose, they'd have to bring in a new crew just to take the train back to Oakland for servicing. That could get expensive, especially if the contract requires payment for some minimum number of hours per shift (I don't know whether it does, but I've seen it in other union contracts.)
Agreed and I am pretty sure there are qualified engineers to SAC in Oakland, since many Capitol Corridor trains originate/terminate there. It may even be the same pool as San Jose. If they had to, they could van the SAC-SJC engineer back to SJC if they had to get the engineer back to SJC. Or deadhead him on a Capitol Corridor train.
A nice meal in the dining car as the northbound Coast Starlight skirts Puget Sound at sunset was one of the seaside treats of that route.
Besides that one, the Coast Starlight was rerouted in 1982 from serving Orland, to serving Sacramento, Chico, and Marysville. In 1999, it rerouted on a shorter ex WP route, bypassing Marysville.
Isn't that a place prone to washouts?
In winter 1969 my school company at Fort Ord was put on alert in case help was needed with flooding. A few days later I rode the Del Monte up to SF and around Watsonville it was like travel on a ferry -- water on both sides of the track up to the ties.
Elkhorn is a massive challenge that no one wants to deal with. Bypassing it won’t be easy and good luck getting permits and environmental review done to lift and double track that segment.
