Through the Cajon Pass on UP tracks?

[ParanoidAndroid]

Say the Starlight is scheduled to detour over the Tehachapi Pass and through the San Joaquin Valley. Then, one morning, an accident happens in the Soledad Canyon and the Starlight is unable to get through. Would Amtrak then go up the Cajon Pass on the Palmdale cutoff, then proceed north through the pass and the valley?

I've read about an excursion from LA to Mojave in 1983, but has Amtrak ever run over it since? I'd love to know.

 

[chakk]

Given the much longer travel time to go east to San Berdoo, then north thru Cajon Pass, then west on the Palmdale Cutoff to Mojave, I suspect that Amtrak would simply annul the CS that day and provide no alternate transportation.

 

[railiner]

They could take that longer detour if they just bypassed Oakland, and went directly to Sacramento, and recover all that lost time, with connecting trains or buses to/from the Bay area....IIRC, the first time they detoured over Tehachapi for scheduled coast line track work, that is just what they did, and just had to sit in Sacramento for quite a while to be back 'on time'...

 

[KmH]

. . . but has Amtrak ever run over it since? I'd love to know.

The Southwest Chief goes over Cajon Pass daily.

 

[railiner]

Other than the mentioned excursion, I don't believe there has ever been scheduled passenger service over the Palmdale Cutoff. There was regular passenger service back in the Santa Fe era by the San Francisco Chief from Barstow to Mojave. I don't know if Santa Fe ever ran a train from Los Angeles to Oakland or Richmond via that long roundabout route...they always used buses to connect from Los Angeles to Bakersfield for their "Golden Gates"...

 

[ParanoidAndroid]

. . . but has Amtrak ever run over it since? I'd love to know.

The Southwest Chief goes over Cajon Pass daily.

Yes, I was talking about the Palmdale cutoff... pretty interesting history to it.