Sunset Route | |
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![]() Union Pacific GE AC4400CW No. 7277 leads between a wind farm and desert land outside the town of Cabazon in Riverside County, California (2013) | |
Overview | |
Status | operational |
Owner | Union Pacific Railroad |
Locale | southwestern United States |
Termini | |
Service | |
Operator(s) | Union Pacific, Amtrak, BNSF (partial) |
Technical | |
Number of tracks | 1–2 |
Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge |
The Sunset Route is a main line of the Union Pacific Railroad running between Southern California and New Orleans, Louisiana. [1] It is the southernmost railway that connects the central United States to the U.S. Pacific Coast.
The idea for this railroad dated before the American Civil War, as businessmen in the Southern United States wanted a direct connection to the Pacific Ocean. This was the rationale for the Gadsden Purchase. [2]
The name traces its origins to the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railway, a Southern Pacific Railroad subsidiary which was known as the Sunset Route as early as 1874.[ citation needed ] The line was built by several different companies and largely consolidated under Southern Pacific, with completion at the Colorado River in 1883. [3] Its construction prompted a frog war at the Colton Crossing, where it intersects the Southern Transcon, then owned by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, and now by BNSF Railway.
The first trains departed for through service between Los Angeles, California and New Orleans on February 5, 1883. [4]
The Sunset Route previously extended northward from Los Angeles to San Francisco, California. [5] [6]
The Sunset Route's western terminus officially begins about 71 miles (115 km) east of Los Angeles, in West Colton, California. Going eastward, the route immediately faces steep inclines of up to 1.9% as it reaches 2,560 feet (780 m) in elevation at Beaumont Hill, near Palm Springs, California. It then turns southeast, quickly dropping to 201 feet (61 m) below sea level at Wister, California on the landlocked Salton Sea. The route rises to 385 feet (117 m) in elevation before dropping again as it goes through Yuma, Arizona, near the California and Mexico borders and close to where the Gila River discharges into the Colorado River. It turns directly east to Maricopa, Arizona, at the southern edge of the Phoenix metropolitan area, before turning to the southeast again to Tucson, Arizona. Heading eastward again, the route rises to 4,557 feet (1,389 m) at Dragoon in southeast Arizona, drops to 3,600 feet (1,100 m) in San Simon, Arizona, and then crosses the Continental Divide at 4,554 feet (1,388 m) elevation at Wilna in southwest New Mexico before crossing into Texas at the Mexican border metropolis of El Paso. [7] [8] The Sunset Route is the lowest railway that crosses the Continental Divide. [9]
At El Paso, the Sunset Route splits off into the Golden State Route, which is another main line that Union Pacific acquired in the Southern Pacific merger that heads northeast to Kansas City, Missouri and Chicago, Illinois. The Sunset Route itself turns southeast past El Paso near the Rio Grande River within the Trans-Pecos region of West Texas. At the town of Sierra Blanca, Texas, 90 miles (140 km) from El Paso, the Sunset Route meets the western end of the former Texas and Pacific main line, acquired by Union Pacific when it merged with Missouri Pacific, that goes east-northeast through the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. [10] The Sunset Route continues heading roughly southeast within the Rio Grande watershed until it arrives at the Mexican border city of Del Rio, Texas; at that point, the route turns directly east through San Antonio, Texas, the Gulf Coast metropolis of Houston, Texas, and the eastern terminus of New Orleans, in southeast Louisiana on the Mississippi River Delta. [7] [11] Between San Antonio and New Orleans, the Sunset Route meets several other Union Pacific-controlled main lines and branch lines, [12] [13] [14] of which many are directional running operations. [15]
The line is primarily used for freight, especially of intermodal freight transport, due to its close proximity and rail connections to the Port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach. In the 1980s, Southern Pacific pioneered the carrying of intermodal containers on double-stack trains on the Sunset Route. The route also moves finished automobiles, grain, and other non-intermodal freight. [17]
In 1998, the Los Angeles to El Paso section of the Sunset Route was hosting about 33 trains per day. [18] By 2007, 45 trains daily were operating through Maricopa, Arizona, [19] 55 daily trains were running in 2015, and 90 were projected after the full completion of the second track on the Los Angeles to El Paso section. [20] However, by 2019 the number of daily trains between Los Angeles and El Paso had dropped to 39, and the section east of El Paso in the Trans-Pecos region was hosting 12 trains per day. [18] In June 2024, the daily traffic in Wellton, Arizona was 28 trains (14 in each direction), of which a majority were intermodal freight trains, about a quarter were mixed freight trains, and 6% carried automobiles. The reduced number of trains were somewhat offset by increasingly large train lengths; several of the longest trains observed were at least 18,000 feet (5,500 m) in length. [21]
The Amtrak Sunset Limited operates three round-trips weekly over the entirety of the route, and the Texas Eagle from Chicago is attached between San Antonio and Los Angeles. In December 2023, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) announced a grant through its Corridor ID Program to increase the frequency of the Sunset Limited to full daily round-trip service. The program also issued grants to develop state-supported passenger routes between San Antonio and Houston, in the Phoenix–Tucson Corridor (using Sunset Route track between Picacho, Arizona and Tucson), and in the Coachella Valley Rail Corridor (using Sunset Route track between Colton, California and Coachella, California). [22]
When Southern Pacific Railroad merged with Union Pacific in 1996, the operating plan that was filed along with the merger application stipulated that one of the first major investments would be to double-track the Sunset Route between Los Angeles and El Paso. [23] At the time of the merger, only about 152 miles (245 km), or approximately 20% of the route, were double-tracked. [7] [24] However, the combined company's efforts to expand double-trackage between Los Angeles and El Paso were soon delayed in favor of more profitable investments on Union Pacific's pre-existing lines north of the Sunset Route to improve coal-hauling capacity or to better handle mixed-freight trains along the Central Corridor. [23] Building on Southern Pacific's successful efforts in the 1980s to revive the Golden State Route from near disuse, [17] the merged company invested hundreds of million US dollars more to make extra improvements to the Golden State Route, and it spent similar amounts to rehabilitate the Texas and Pacific line from similar inactivity. Because of these updates, daily traffic increased on the Texas and Pacific line from 2 trains in 1996 to 19 trains in 2004. Both lines funneled additional trains onto the Sunset Route's Los Angeles–El Paso section, which exacerbated the traffic meltdown that occurred there in 2003–2004 after Union Pacific underestimated the strong economic recovery from the early 2000s recession. [10]
Work to add the second track picked up in the mid-2000s, [19] [25] and by late 2007, Union Pacific was targeting the complete double-tracking of the 757-mile (1,218 km) Los Angeles–El Paso section by the end of 2010. [26] [27] By 2012, 72% of that section, or 547 miles (880 km), would have two tracks, including the entire section between Tucson and El Paso. Union Pacific no longer provided a specific timeline for full completion of the second track, though. [28] As of 2015 [update] , the double-tracking project reached 80% completion. [20] In 2024, Union Pacific announced the resumption of work to add the second main line on the remaining 127 miles (204 km) of single-track railway. [29] [30]
The new trackage would allow for maximum speeds of 70 miles per hour (110 km/h) for freight trains. It would incorporate concrete sleeper railroad ties, a track spacing of 20 feet (6 m), and a rail weight of 141 pounds per yard (70 kg/m), [7] [31] which are Union Pacific's standards for tracks supporting heavy axle loads and for new double-track construction. [32]
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The Union Pacific has divided the Sunset Route into these subdivisions for operational purposes:
BNSF Railway is the largest freight railroad in the United States. One of six North American Class I railroads, BNSF has 36,000 employees, 33,400 miles (53,800 km) of track in 28 states, and over 8,000 locomotives. It has three transcontinental routes that provide rail connections between the western and eastern United States. BNSF trains traveled over 169 million miles in 2010, more than any other North American railroad.
The Southern Pacific was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the names Southern Pacific Railroad, Southern Pacific Company and Southern Pacific Transportation Company.
The Texas Eagle is a long-distance passenger train operated daily by Amtrak on a 1,306-mile (2,102 km) route between Chicago, Illinois, and San Antonio, Texas, with major stops in St. Louis, Little Rock, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Austin. Three days per week, the train joins the Sunset Limited in San Antonio and continues to Los Angeles via El Paso and Tucson. The combined 2,728-mile (4,390 km) route is the longest in the United States and the second-longest in the Americas, after the Canadian.
The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the largest Class 1 railroads in the United States between 1859 and 1996.
The Coast Starlight is a long-distance passenger train operated by Amtrak on the West Coast of the United States between Seattle and Los Angeles via Portland and the San Francisco Bay Area. The train, which has operated continuously since Amtrak's formation in 1971, was the first to offer direct service between Seattle and Los Angeles. Its name is a combination of two prior Southern Pacific (SP) trains, the Coast Daylight and the Starlight.
The Sunset Limited is a long-distance passenger train run by Amtrak, operating on a 1,995-mile (3,211 km) route between New Orleans and Los Angeles. Major stops include Houston, San Antonio and El Paso in Texas, as well as Tucson, Arizona. Opening in 1894 through the Southern Pacific Railroad, the Sunset Limited is the oldest continuously operating named train in the United States.
Kansas City Southern de México, S.A. de C.V. is a Mexican railroad and operating subsidiary of Canadian Pacific Kansas City Limited (CPKC). The company was founded in 1996 as Transportación Ferroviaria Mexicana, a joint venture between KCS and Transportación Maritima Mexicana after the companies won a concession from the Mexican government to operate the 5,335-kilometer (3,315 mi) Northeast Railroad connecting Monterrey and Mexico City with a US port of entry at Laredo, Texas and seaports at Lázaro Cárdenas and Veracruz. In 2005, KCS bought out its partner's shares in the railroad, giving it full control.
The Alameda Corridor is a 20-mile (32 km) freight rail "expressway" owned by the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority that connects the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach with the transcontinental mainlines of the BNSF Railway and the Union Pacific Railroad that terminate near downtown Los Angeles, California. Running largely in a trench below Alameda Street, the corridor was considered one of the region's largest transportation projects when it was constructed in the 1990s and early 2000s.
The Golden State was a named passenger train between Chicago and Los Angeles from 1902–1968 on the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad and the Southern Pacific Company (SP) and predecessors. It was named for California, the “Golden State”.
The Argonaut was the Southern Pacific Railroad's secondary passenger train between New Orleans and Los Angeles via Houston, San Antonio, and El Paso, Texas; Tucson, Arizona; and Palm Springs, California. It started in 1926 on a 61 hr 35 min schedule Los Angeles to New Orleans, five hours slower than the Sunset Limited; it was discontinued west of Houston in 1958. In earlier years it carried sleeping cars from New Orleans to Yuma that would continue to San Diego via San Diego and Arizona Eastern Railway, a SP subsidiary. Westbound trains carried sleeping cars from New Orleans and Houston to San Antonio.
The Coast Line is a railroad line between Burbank, California and the San Francisco Bay Area, roughly along the Pacific Coast. It is the shortest rail route between Los Angeles and the Bay Area. Though not as busy as the Surf Line, the continuation of the Coast Line southbound to San Diego, it still sees freight movements and many passenger trains. The Pacific Surfliner, which runs from the San Diego Santa Fe Depot to San Luis Obispo via Union Station in Los Angeles, is the third busiest Amtrak route, and the busiest outside of the Northeast Corridor between Washington D.C. and Boston.
Phoenix Union Station is a former train station at 401 South 4th Avenue in downtown Phoenix, Arizona, United States. From 1971 to 1996 it was an Amtrak station. Until 1971, it was a railroad stop for the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific Railroads. Union Station was served by Amtrak's Los Angeles–New Orleans Sunset Limited and Los Angeles–Chicago Texas Eagle. The station is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Tucson station is an Amtrak train depot in Tucson, Arizona, served three times a week by the combined Sunset Limited/Texas Eagle train.
Santa Fe Depot is a union station in San Diego, California, built by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to replace the small Victorian-style structure erected in 1887 for the California Southern Railroad Company. The Spanish Colonial Revival style station is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a San Diego Historic Landmark. Its architecture, particularly the signature twin domes, is often echoed in the design of modern buildings in downtown San Diego.
Pomona–Downtown station, is a train station in Pomona, California, United States. It is primarily served by Metrolink’s Riverside Line commuter rail service. The station is also served by limited Amtrak long-distance inter-city rail service, with the thrice-weekly round trip of the combined Sunset Limited/Texas Eagle. It is owned and operated by the city of Pomona.
The Southern Transcon is a main line of the BNSF Railway comprising 11 subdivisions between Southern California and Chicago, Illinois. Completed in its current alignment in 1908 by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, when it opened the Belen Cutoff in New Mexico and bypassed the steep grades of Raton Pass, it now serves as a mostly double-tracked intermodal corridor.
The Hawthorne–El Segundo Line was an interurban railway route of the Pacific Electric Railway. It was built to transport oil from the Standard Oil Refinery in El Segundo and also saw passenger service. Unlike most corridors which hosted Pacific Electric passengers, the line remains largely intact as the Union Pacific El Segundo Industrial Lead.
The history of the Southern Pacific ("SP") stretched from 1865 to 1998.
Barstow Yard is a classification yard operated by Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway (BNSF) in Barstow, California. With 48 directional tracks and a total area of approximately 600 acres (240 ha), it is the second largest classification yard west of the Rocky Mountains after the J.R. Davis Yard. Today, almost all freight traffic to and from Southern California runs through the junction.
The Phoenix Subdivision is a railroad line in the U.S. state of Arizona owned by the Union Pacific Railroad. The southeast end of the line connects to the Gila Subdivision near Eloy, runs northeast to Phoenix, and becomes the Roll Industrial Lead, running southwest before reconnecting to the Gila Subdivision at Wellton. As of 2010, eighty miles (130 km) of the line between Roll and Arlington are out of service and used for car storage.