18 photos
http://www.polarinertia.com/may05/intermodal01.htm
I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.
I don't have a leg to stand on.
Great photos for those that may want to model such a huge facility. The trailer rack is interesting. So that's what they look like.
How do they get them horizontal ?
Mike
My You Tube
For those who don’t recognize it, that is San Bernardino, looking east from the Mt. Vernon street overpass. At the east end of the yard the tracks head north and go up Cajon Pass. Considering how green the foothills look and how much snow is on the mountains I would say it is winter or spring. Mt. San Bernardino and Mt. San Gorgonio are due east. Slide Peak at Snow Valley Ski Area is the peak on the far left.
This area used to be the locomotive shops which were moved to Kansas City in the 1990s. It is one of the businesses intermodal yards in the world, taking hundreds of trucks off of the highways every day. There are also a couple of pictures from another yard.
I see this yard everyday but I have never seen them actually stand the empty container trailers up or lay them down. I always assumed they did it with the intermodal lifts.
Change google maps to satellite view to see it from space and you can truly see how big it is and how many trailers and containers are there, most of them are leaving southern California and heading east to the rest of the country, including non stops to Chicago which arrive in record time. Impact spine cars were designed specifically for that run and have become the industry standard.
https://www.google.com/maps/@34.1067522,-117.3119819,965m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en
In case you were wondering which side is the wrong side of the tracks: 5th street and Mt. Vernon is one of the most dangerous areas in the USA.
Lone Wolf and Santa Fe Mt. Vernon is one of the most dangerous areas in the USA.
Russell
csxns Lone Wolf and Santa Fe Mt. Vernon is one of the most dangerous areas in the USA. Dangerous how?
Dangerous how?
Very high crime rate, especially for murder.
Lone Wolf and Santa FeVery high crime rate, especially for murder.
It's fairly safe to visit if you stay on the main streets, just don't live near there or wonder aimlessly through the residential areas. If you want to go to the train depot it is on the other side of the yard on 2nd street and has security. The depot serves Amtrak and Metrolink and has secure parking. Some government offices are also located in the depot as well as the museum.
Lone Wolf and Santa Fe It is one of the businesses intermodal yards in the world, taking hundreds of trucks off of the highways every day.
What? LOL How do You think those can's get from the Intermodal yard to the customer? By TRUCK......... and in the case of shipper...it still goes to the Intermodal yard by Truck. All they did is slow down the long haul shipping by truck and in reality, not by much.
Take Care!
Frank
Except it did take those trucks off of the highways. That's an observable fact.
I remember on my long road trips of my youth seeing vast fleets of JB Hunt and Schneider trucks. Now I only see them on the spine cars going past my office window. There's virtually no long haul trucks going down 95 in DC and Virginia, but endless streams of them on CSX.
Still see plenty of OTR trucks just not the big intermodal guys like JB Hunt
Joe Staten Island West
NittanyLionJB Hunt and Schneider trucks.
I'll grant You this.....which is a good thing...reason being....most of them couldn't drive anyway...they just got in the way. I was going to type a whole big post about My life in the trucking industry, but changed My mind. I will just say...I started when I was 18yrs.old in 1960 and fully retired in 2004, after being a long haul driver for PIE, DC and Indianhead truck line tanker division. In 1982 I went on My own with My own trucks, with 3 drivers working for Me....We handled nothing but Intermodal traffic, two trucks being leased to CSX Intermodal...primarily UPS, USPS and specialty loads some of which missed the train....in all cases we always beat the train. I could go on...but won't.....also have two Son's who work for the Railroad Intermodal industry...one at CSX Intermodal as a Yardmaster for 18yr.s and the other at UP Intermodal as an ATM for 15yr.s......I pretty much know what I'm talking about...........