The
Southern Pacific ran commuter trains along the peninsula route (San Francisco
to San Jose) from the early 1900’s until the service was taken over by Caltrain
in 1982. SP bought ten 145-seat
double-deck gallery cars from Pullman Standard in 1955. These were followed by 21 more ACF-built cars
in 1956-7, and 15 more PS cars in 1968.
The 1955-57 gallery cars were delivered in dignified two-tone gray
paint, but during the 60’s were gradually repainted solid gray with gray painted
doors. The 1968 gallery cars were
painted solid gray with unpainted aluminum doors. It was very common to see cars of both paint
schemes mixed together. Consists had 1-8
cars depending on the traffic demands and the platform length of the stations
in the trip. In the early pre-freeway
years, trains had more cars: rush hour trains also had more cars. Many of the rush hour trains used the old
Harriman-roofed standard coaches (in 1969 SP had 55 standard coaches and 46
gallery cars). The SP gallery cars were
retired by Caltrain in 1985 and replaced with stainless steel push-pull Nippon
Sharyo cars.
Fairbanks-Morse
trainmasters were the favorite commute power because of their ability to rapidly
accelerate between the frequent commuter stops.
Initially the trainmasters were in the black widow paint shown below,
but in the 60’s they were repainted in the gray and scarlet bloody nose scheme
before their retirement in 1972. A
similar commuter train for the late 1960s to early 1970s should be led by a
bloody nose trainmaster. EMD GP-9’s were
also used and completely replaced the Trainmasters by 1972. They had dual
controls so the locomotive did not have to be turned. None of these SP gallery passenger cars had
engineer controls, and the locomotive was always in the lead. The post-1985 Caltrain cars with an
engineer’s cab greatly simplified operations with push-pull running and no
reversal of the locomotive.
Photo of an SP rush hour
commute train in the 1960s just south of San Francisco. Photo from page 160 of
Dorin’s Commuter Railroads.
Southbound rush-hour
train #136 in the late 1960s. Note the solid gray repainted car four cars back,
and the old standard height coaches probably dating to the twenties on the
rear. Power is a Fairbanks-Morse Trainmaster. Photo from page 157 of Dorin’s Commuter
Railroads.
Commute
train on September 15, 1957 powered by two black widow GP9s. From page 188 of Signor’s Southern Pacific’s Coast Line.
The beauty
of this train is that a prototype train can be purchased off the shelf without
modification. The trainmaster is from
Atlas. The SP black widow scheme was
released as a model in 2000, and the later SP bloody nose model came later. The gallery cars (prototypes made by ACF and
PS in 1956-7) are available from Wheels-of-Time in both two-tone gray and solid
gray. The cars include a lavatory window
at one end. Unlike many other passenger
cars, the gallery cars are prototypical as modeled and painted.
REFERENCES
Dorin, Patrick, Commuter Railroads, A pictorial review of the most traveled trains, Superior Publishing Co., 1970.
McGovern, Janet, Caltrain and the Peninsula Commute Service, Arcadia Publishing, 128 pages, 2012.
Ryan, Dennis, and Joseph Shine, Southern Pacific Passenger Trains, vol. 2, Day trains of the coast line, Four Ways West publications, 2000.
Signor, John, Southern Pacific’s Coast Line, Signature Press, 1995.
