On the Job
January 21, 2008
The Santa Maria Valley Railroad hauled 18 freight cars in from the Guadalupe exchange today.
Customer-related pictures from the day are available here.
The day started by maneuvering No. 1801 out of the downtown yard.
An SMVRR track gang was working out by PictSweet.
Over the hood of No. 1801 is the local Union Pacific cutting out cars from last night's freight. The white cars are reefers bound for PictSweet. The Guadalupe local looked like a patched Denver and Rio Grande (D&RG) unit, probably an old GP40-2; a rare, old locomotive on the U.P. roster. At left are two outbound tank cars.
A view from the cab of No. 1801 of the operating U.P. local (in the distance, upper right).
Over in the U.P. yard not too far from the Guadalupe Amtrak station (upper left), No. 1801 comes to pick up the cars for the Santa Maria Valley (just to the right of the U.P. local).
The U.P. local pulls away with SMVRR's three outbound cars for the day.
Now for a little switching in the Guadalupe yard to get the cars in some semblance of order for the drop-offs on the way home.
One can barely see the brakeman/conductor on the point as these reefers are shoved into the PictSweet siding.
The camera caught this bird of prey along the airbase line (runs to the airport industrial area).
The last spot of the day was this boxcar at the depot's unloading ramp. It's a load of OSB for transloading to Weyrick Lumber.