Photo Gallery

30th Anniversary of the San Joaquin
Optimized for a screen resolution of 1024x768
Train time at Riverbank. F40PH 229 waits patiently for the order to Highball as passengers disembark for the "City Of Action." Amtrak train crews jokingly called Riverbank The Gateway To Modesto. (To skip the intro click on the above photo)


Photography by Ken Rattenne 
(Except where noted)
The year 2004 marked the 30th anniversary of Amtrak's San Joaquin service between Oakland-Sacramento and Bakersfield. Starting off with a single roundtip each day the San Joaquin Corridor has had phenominal passenger growth over the years. Today's service sees six roundtrips a day: Four between Bakersfield and Oakland and two between Bakersfield and Sacramento!

Upon inauguration  in 1974, equipment was but a pair of E9As pulling three or four steam-heated cars. The E9s soon gave way to a pair of ex-Southern Pacific FP7As, which lasted until 1976.  By the late 1970s the train had been converted to Head End Power (HEP) with the assignment of new F40PHs and Amfleet cars. 

The late 1980s saw equipment change again, this time to the new single level Horizon Fleet cars. And finally, during the 1990s Horizon Fleet cars were themselves replaced with bilevel California Cars through the auspices of CalTrans. 

This photo feature documents the San Joaquins between 1974-2004, and serves  to illustrate many changes the service has seen over the years.  So enjoy, and please let me know if you spot a factual error.  (rattenne@earthlink.net).

Note: I've optimized this feature to be viewed at 1024x768 screen resultion.


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This document is © Copyright 2004-2010 by Ken Rattenne and KPR Media Services
and was last updated in August 2010.