Re: (rshsdepot) Bakersfield to LA

["Paul Luchter" <luckyshow_@_mindspring.com>]

well, of course, the scenery in the Valley is duller, though on  a clear day
the vistas to the mountains on each side are breathtaking...

but what I was thinking was here in this article they were waxing poetic
about the different routes and their different auras, if you will--and San
Luis Obispo v Modesto is not really a choice but a rhetorical question--

That the leisurely route flat as a pancake on the San Joaquin, serving
Scranton, Sacto and the Bay Area and the vast breadbasket (or water thirsty
basketcase) in the Big Valley....but there is LA which for the most part is
just as connected if not more, especially historically to the other side of
the pass (well, ok, the Southwest really is their kin..).....Bakersfield
people don't think about The City (as in the city by the Golden Gate), but
of that sprawling mess down there with the smog and the smug, LA and the
rest of the portal to the Lower California peninsula..

No one will ever wax poetic about a bus, I doubt anyone has (well Paul Simon
in that song about coming to NY 6 days from Michigan...), wouldn't that
attract tourists: a train from LA, with connecting sections from San Luis
Obispo and San Diego that went to Tahoe and Reno; wouldn't it also attract
more riders from Merced to the southern coast?

Time is not always a factor- remember when Amtrak would go south from
Cheyenne to Denver and then head all the way back to Wyoming to continue
west...and you did one of these legs facing backwards..?

And those trains were usually filled with festive travelers (or so my bar
car remembrances remember it that way at least...)

Yeah I know we are talking commuter trains here for the most part...and my
favorite now, oh I would just go to the area on a vacation to take it, is
the ACE train from San Jose to Stockton that uses the old WP route, too bad
they don't have one continuing on the Feather River canyon, but oh
well...don't they have a tourist line using that yet, what a waste? (and
that was a round-about route to Nevada wasn't it?)



Does the San Joaquin go north from Stockton to Sacramento now? Is there a
section? LOL

Paul
- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Norm Metcalf" <metcalf_@_attglobal.net>
To: <rshsdepot_@_lists.railfan.net>
Sent: Monday, August 11, 2003 11:40 PM
Subject: Re: (rshsdepot) Bakersfield to LA


> What I've heard involves two factors.  Bakersfield to LA is faster by bus
> and Tehachapi Pass is congested with freights of both the BNSF and the UP.
> Even pre-AMTK the ATSF used buses between LA and Bakersfield to make
better
> time between LA and Oakland than the SP did.  Myself, in the 1940's and
> 1950's I preferred the Coast Daylight, the scenery was worth the extra
time.
>     Norm Metcalf, Boulder CO
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Paul Luchter" <luckyshow_@_mindspring.com>
> To: "RSHS Depot" <rshsdepot_@_lists.railfan.net>
> Sent: Monday, August 11, 2003 9:36 PM
> Subject: (rshsdepot) Bakersfield to LA
>
>
> > oh please tell me why there is no rail connection/extension of San
Joaquin
> to the Southland? [the bus connection is as lame as a Coast train that has
> to bypass Oregon when they opt out]
> >
> > Paul
> >
>
>
> =================================
> The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
> railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org
>

=================================
The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org

------------------------------

End of RSHSDepot Digest V1 #729
*******************************

=================================
The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org