A Day on The Southern Pacific's Suisun Bridge - March 14, 1994 4K
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ม.ค. 2024
- On March 14, 1994 I was "camped" at the west end of the Southern Pacific's Railroad Bridge and had a goal of taking photographs and videoing trains. As I was watching a ship go underneath the bridge, the day operator was showing up for his turn to work and saw me, and after a small discussion he invited me to join him and watch the operations of this great draw bridge.
That guy has probably got the coolest office on the whole SP at this time
Fascinating!
Fantastic video. I’ve gone past on the auto bridge hundreds of times over the past 60 years and twice over the rail bridge. This was a real treat to see the bridge’s operation!
Very very cool. Thanks to All of us that will never see this kind of ops in person!!
Fantastic video, that is a once in a lifetime event! I grew up near Benicia, so saw that bridge a bunch, and even crossed the railroad bridge a bunch commuting to work on the Capitol Corridor after college. Enjoyed the look back at the 'good old days'.
I am old enough to recall that area while the ferries still operated. I still visit my family who still live in Martinez. I worked as a Firefighter for several years at Station 14 in downtown in the 1970s. Great memories and recording of places never seen before. Thanks Doug.
Thank you!
Great video. Thanks for sharing this classic, once in a lifetime experience!!!!
Thank you!
Back when I680/780 was just the one bridge. I don't miss the weekend traffic out of the bay on that. Also back when the Mothball fleet still existed (although maybe there are still 2 left? pretty sure last I looked it was all gone and a relic of my childhood.)
Fantastic to see the bridge up close, along with the USS Halsey. What a great view and info about the bridge and signal. Lucky you!! Thanks, Doug!
Indeed very lucky Dave..... thank you!
I've watched that thing go up and down once. Great you got to look. I got to the top of the North Tower of the Golden Gate bridge once when doing some work with the bridge district.
Great video. I live in Benicia and have spent countless hours in traffic on the old bridge watching that thing going up and down. I'd forgotten just how many ships use to be moored in the mothball fleet. Today they are (thankfully) all gone.
Many thanks to “Mr Bridge operator” ❤️❤️❤️❤️🙂
My father worked for Southern Pacific and would run in front of the trains opening 3 trestles. The biggest one across coos bay in Oregon spun and did not lift .It had a glass floor in one spot that you could stand on and watch the trains go under you .I also ride lots of engines and cabooses from the depot to Florence or ride with my father out to Florence so he could escort the train back to the depot .I see the machinery and can almost smell.that place .
I did a speeder run on the Coos Bay years ago and to me, that's one of the most beautiful trips ever. Thanks for your response
Excellent video! You said it "once in a life time'
So glad you captured that, definitely rare footage. Dolph Pierce used to run the bridge in the mid-80s, no idea either who the guy is in your video. I took 14 to work one morning from MTZ to Emeryville and it just happened to be the day when six tugs grabbed onto the Glomar Explorer to begin its slow journey to Texas, first top was Hunters Point in SF iirc. Bill Cotton was the conductor that day, was so neat to see a big boat leave and not immediately be cut up for scrap.
Thanks very much. I never met Bill Cotton but I understand he was quite the guy.
That’s a nice trip back in time, I used to do the I-680 commute across the bridge during the 90’s before most of the ships were scrapped. It was a nice view while stuck in traffic waiting to get through the tool booth.
What an experience! Great video.
Thanks!
Not Northern California, i was born in Sacramento and it’s in the center of the State, Redding, Mt. Shasta and Eureka are north, lol. I remember when Suisun Bay mothball fleet was full,of ships in the up’s, just amazing.
Luck and Fate were with you that day. Awesome.
I remember working as a switchman in Ozol talking to the guy on the bridge. We'd go out to Avon or do the Shell job, and I always thought it was odd we were getting track lists and information from the bridge lol What a fun time looking back. Except for Avon, that place was full of spiders.
I worked Ozol as well - ‘06😂 conductor on the C&H job, and Benicia auto facility and so much more! I’ve left sugar alone ever since working that job..lol
@@dezy8941 Yeah, lol funny how that works out.
Awesome views! Great video!
im so happy i got this suggested to me, i was just in martinez the other day and was thinking about how little footage there is of SP around the Suisun Bridge and on the opposite side. awesome vid
Glad you enjoyed it.... thank you!
great video! very unique angle. Cool to see SP out there too! I've never seen this bridge operate before, i know it's still used though. Since the video was taken, another side of the freeway has also been added.
The second northbound bridge was built between 2001 and 2007. It originally had a huge toll booth on the Martinez size, but that was phased out in favor of FasTrak electronic toll collection and toll collection by photography of driver license plates and billing based on that plate.
Can you imagine a RR employee doing something like that nowadays? But what a treat.
I do wonder though - his 'uniform' was way too clean for an SP guy!
He was a pretty casual guy form everything I recall. I believe he is an SP employee and I'm pretty sure he lived in Martinez. And even then I was shocked that he invited me to come up to the control booth. Notice my trepidation even when an SP train is crossing the bridge and I'm filming it but the operator told me it was no problem.
Do you think he's retired by now?@@b.douglasjensen
Today u have the Starlight,Zephyr and over a dozen Capitol Corridor trains in each direction crossing and a handfull of UP Freights,even Stack trains heading east/_west
Cool but death defying actually walking out on the bridge like that!
Did the operator tell you why there are chains hanging from the bottom of the lift span on each end? I was enamored with the lift and machinery room. I and another guy went to the Atchafalaya River bridge at Simmsport, LA in 1971 to receive instructions on how to open and close the turn span if we needed to do so.
I didn't even see the chains so I'll have to relook at the video.
@@b.douglasjensen There are usually some chains attached to the bottom of each end of the lift span and the abutment or bottom of each lift tower. These are meant to match the added weight of the cables holding the counterweights. There is a weight change in the cables as the span is raised and lowered which needs to be taken into consideration to even the load on the lifting motors. Those chains do that. Also, that bridge was the heaviest moveable bridge when built and it replaced very unique ferry for moving trains across the river. There was a story about the ferry in either LIVE STEAM and OUTDOOR RAILROADS MAGAZINE or NARROW GAUGE & SHORT LINE GAZETTE MAGAZINE. The ferry operated for about 40 or so years before the bridge was built. What is left of it can still be seen in an estuary on the east side of the Bay. At 4:05 is one of the 4 taper rails to fill the gaps in the rails and a lock mechanism to interlock with the signal system.
USS Halsey was scrapped in 2003.