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Re: HERCULES POWER PLANT CALIF ..INDUSTRIAL TRACKAGE ?
Author: Juppo
Date: 07-02-2011 - 16:36
Ken Shattock (KRK) Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Mr. Juppo-- Thank you for your information on
> Hercules. For years I have tried to explain on
> different forumns about the small railway that I
> used to see in the 50's when traveling on upper
> San Pablo Avenue (old Highway 40).. I was
> particularly shot down on my statement regarding
> the "tunnel" under I-80... Heck, you could see it
> plain as day from the right hand lane of the
> freeway while driving West.
>
> What was the gauge ? No one knows! From the
> freeway sighting or years earlier from U.S. 40,
> I always seemed to think it was somewhere around
> 12-16 inches. Care to guess ?
> Thanks again..
>
> KRK
I have never seen in writing the actual gauge of the railroad but it was not 3 feet and wider than 16" for sure. The track I saw in person and after studying photographs closely, I want to say 30." This is just a guess, but it was definitely within 6" of 30."
Yeah the tunnel under I80 is little known. If it weren't for Chuck Zeiss and George Manly whom I've run into several times simply because I grew up in Pinole, I would never have known it.
For two decades in the early 20th century Pinole-Hercules boasted two Class 1 RRs with depots, semaphores, signal bridges, industrial customers, mainline and narrow gauge tunnels, trestles and viaducts, a narrow gauge RR all its own and wharves with rails. Am I missing anything? All of this in an area of about 3 square miles or less. Shame I wasn't born until 1984.
-------------------------------------------------------
> Mr. Juppo-- Thank you for your information on
> Hercules. For years I have tried to explain on
> different forumns about the small railway that I
> used to see in the 50's when traveling on upper
> San Pablo Avenue (old Highway 40).. I was
> particularly shot down on my statement regarding
> the "tunnel" under I-80... Heck, you could see it
> plain as day from the right hand lane of the
> freeway while driving West.
>
> What was the gauge ? No one knows! From the
> freeway sighting or years earlier from U.S. 40,
> I always seemed to think it was somewhere around
> 12-16 inches. Care to guess ?
> Thanks again..
>
> KRK
I have never seen in writing the actual gauge of the railroad but it was not 3 feet and wider than 16" for sure. The track I saw in person and after studying photographs closely, I want to say 30." This is just a guess, but it was definitely within 6" of 30."
Yeah the tunnel under I80 is little known. If it weren't for Chuck Zeiss and George Manly whom I've run into several times simply because I grew up in Pinole, I would never have known it.
For two decades in the early 20th century Pinole-Hercules boasted two Class 1 RRs with depots, semaphores, signal bridges, industrial customers, mainline and narrow gauge tunnels, trestles and viaducts, a narrow gauge RR all its own and wharves with rails. Am I missing anything? All of this in an area of about 3 square miles or less. Shame I wasn't born until 1984.
