Dr Zarkoff Wrote:
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> The Richmond Shipyard Railway and Parr Terminal
> are two different things. The RSRY was a WWII
> transit operation run by the Key System on behalf
> of the US Maritime Administration from 40th & San
> Pablo in Emeryville to Kaiser's shipyards in
> Richmond. Parr had several terminals: one at the
> foot of Adeline St in Oakland, which had its own
> locomotive(s), another in what became the Oakland
> Army Base, and a third in Richmond near the Kaiser
> shipyards.
>
> The pic shows the intersection of South Harbor Way
> (left-right street) and Wright Ave, which upon
> checking is about 1/2 city block south of where
> the RSRy started using this alignment to shift
> from paralleling Potrero Ave northward to
> paralleling Cutting Blvd (virtually all traces of
> the RSRy along Potrero were obliterated by the
> construction of the freeway).
>
> Th RSRy was double track, electrified. The
> ownership of a lot of trackage in this area of
> Richmond is quite complicated, which has been
> compounded by the passage of time since WWII.
>
> The wye under the Richmond Parkway overpass near
> Ohio Ave is the former connection to the Santa
> Fe's line through El Cerrito and Berkeley to
> Emeryville, which paralleled Ohio all the way to
> San Pablo Ave. This was the former California and
> Nevada RR, a narrow gauge line which Borax Smith
> acquired to obtain the tideland rights for
> building what became the Key Route Pier. He sold
> the rest of the RR between Emeryville and Richmond
> to the Spreckels interests, who were building what
> became the Stockton Sub of the AT&SF. The Santa Fe
> used this wye to turn its passenger trains. When
> the line through Berkeley was abandoned (the
> franchise was about to expire, and traffic had
> dropped perciptously), it was reconfigured to its
> present connection over portions of the RSRy's
> former route to SP's water side drill at Stege.
>
> The Richmond Belt Line was the railroad which
> served the Standard Oil refinery and out the other
> side to serve a whaling station, a tank car
> faciility, the Navy's fuel depot at Point Molate
> (formerly a winery called Winehaven), and finally
> ending up at a quarry at what is now the east end
> of the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, almost but not
> quite making a full circle to the Santa Fe's
> trackage near the Standard Oil Piers a little bit
> further south. Operation was traded between the SP
> and AT&SF every so many years until the late
> 1980s, when a new contract operator appeared on
> the scene. After a few corporate shuffles, this is
> what has become the "Richmond Pacific". The 1980s
> was the beginning of the end for the craft of
> switchmen on both RRs, and I have a vague
> recollection that may have spurred the two RRs
> into being willing to terminate the trading
> agreement. I'm not sure just how the RP came to
> operate other trackage outside of the refinery,
> nor whether there has been changes to the
> ownership of any of the trackage.
>
> And BTW, that wikipedia article is incorrect when
> it refers to the cars at Rio Vista Junction as the
> "oldest electric cars in existence" (the cars
> themselves were built as steam trailers in 1887).
> They are the oldest operable electric rapid
> transit cars. They were electrified between late
> 1902 and early 1903 as part of the first step of
> electrifying all the elevateds in NYC. The Shore
> Line Trolley Museum has an older one, 1872, but it
> was demotorized and used as an employee pay car
> long before leaving the NYC system for the Museum.
> They have to tow it around, and only on very
> special occasions. At the moment, the two at Rio
> Vista are out of service pending repairs.

RPRC is operating the Richmond Belt now? I wasn't aware of that.

As background, in 1989 Chevron completed negotiations with SP and ATSF to take over operation of the Richmond Belt Line, SP's Richmond Transfer Yard and the switching of customers along those properties, through the use of an outside contractor. In exchange, Chevron would receive more favorable rates from SP and ATSF (the agreement was carried over to UP and BNSF).

Chevron hired Western Plant Services, Inc ("Whoopsie"), a subsidiary of Hall-Buck Marine, as their first contractor. After about three years, Hall-Buck/WPSI gave up the contract and a local company called Western Rail Services, Inc, took over. Then 15 years ago or so, the contract passed to RailServe.

UP and BNSF continued to interchange with the contract carrier at Richmond Transfer Yard until UP entered into an agreement with RPRC to take over all remaining ex-SP operations in the Richmond area (except for one customer that was at Stege), and RPRC handled the interchange of traffic with Chevron's contractor at Richmond Transfer Yard.

Unlike Chevron's contractor, RPRC is a common carrier (although I was told awhile back they were considering giving up their certificate). In the original agreement, RPRC was granted trackage rights on UP from Stege to Oakland, but RPRC has always just interchanged their UP cars at Stege (UP sets out onto the "Wall" track below the Stege wye or on "1 Track" between Florida Street and the Amtrak Richmond depot platform; RPRC leaves cars for UP to pick up on "1 Track" west of CP Stege.)