On this busy day, ICTF was very
accomodating to allow a special train to
visit. The physical plant of ICTF is single rail (2 tracks)
access,
with six
working tracks 12 to 17 double-stack cars in length. Two outside
tracks are reserved for run-around and escape track. Usually ICTF
handles 7 outbound and 9 inbound COFC or TOFC trains per day with
approximately 2200 containers
transloaded utilizing 2800 container parking stalls divided up into 5
areas Trains enter and depart through the north end. The
south end of
ICTF contains administration buildings and various offices and control
tower. The entrance gate is located here featuring 16 all
weather,
reversable trucking lanes. Pertinent information is input via
portable
handheld computers at check-in point. This is also a high
security
facility utilizing gates, closed circuit cameras and security
personnel. ICTF's production is more than doubled by use of nine
similar length Dolores Yard tracks to stage double stack cars and/or
portions of made up trains. A high tech real time computer system
allows real time reporting of all yard activities to control
inventory. Hostlers with on-board computer devices move
containers on
chassis to numbered color coded parking stalls. The Ramp Manager
has
the ability to monitor the hostler's performance through the
computer.
Special location finders help truckers find locations of containers in
the yard.
At around 3 p.m. Union Pacific fired up 5013 for the return trip
back to Los Angeles. The few people who had arrived by train
boarded and at 3:30 p.m. the train crew did an air test, moved over one
track and forward northerly, up an outer easterly track at
ICTF. Before the 405 freeway the tracks merged to a set of two
ducking under 223rd Street, the freeway and over Alameda Street to
Dolores
yard.
On the left is the Dolores Locomotive
Facility roundhouse and sand tower. The train crept up Alameda
Street using the Dolores
Industrial Lead track. Union Pacific is rebuilding
some of the Dolores yard tracks and some had not even been ballasted
yet.
The train moved ever closer to the
Alameda Corridor which
has been
no more than a few hundred yards to the west all day. The Dolores
Industrial Lead joins the Alameda Corridor (MP10.6) a few tenths of a
mile south of the 91
freeway. One improvement as part of the corridor improvement plan
was to rebuild Alameda Street and give it a grade separation from the
railroad tracks which are now four tracks wide at this point.
The
Dolores Industrial Lead track contributes one track north into the
corridor
for perhaps a half mile. Just past the Alameda Street grade
separation the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportaion Agency Blue Line
flys over the whole scene. Also at this point (MP11.7), the U.P.
Wilmington Subdivision splits off of the west side of the corridor,
only to rejoin near downtown Los Angeles.
The
corridor now has Alameda Street on the west side and after the 91
freeway overcrossing, the Alameda Corridor dives into a 3 track wide 33
foot deep trench which is 10 miles long. Along the east side of
the corridor trench is a surface track which parallels the trench up
towards the north.
