Caltrain EMU Cab Video Signal Survey

After the loss of the Caltrain gallery car railfan window I wasn't holding out much hope for having anything worthwhile to do on the Caltrain system as European spec rolling stock typically come with bulkhead style cab doors. However videos have been appearing showing that front facing views are present. This have the added benefit of providing a southbound signaling survey as previously such photos and videos were only possible facing northbound. 

I have already covered changes between San Jose and Tamien and can now confirm that the remaining Southern Pacific style signals in the terminal area have been replaced. The good news is that the few SP target type signals on the north end near the tunnels are still in place although unfortunately the triple unilens stacks at CP-COMMON were replaced by a standard LED modular type in a three virtual head configuration. Another note is how bad the sight lines for some of the wayside mast signals have become. This makes clear the advantage for position lights and cab signals in electrified territory. Although the freight spec PTC system Caltrain uses is kinda like a cab signal, moving to a Rule 562 coded track circuit arrangement might save them a lot of trouble. 

You can watch the video for yourself, but despite the hype the weekend and daytime local service is still highly underwhelming with little in the way of interesting signaling or routing. Although faster than diesel, the speeds are still slow compared to a limited stop run and unfortunately these have been largely curtailed with the fastest peak period trains still 3 or 4 minutes slower than the famed 4 or 5 stop Baby Bullets of the 2004-2024 time period.

Southern Caltrain Signaling Changes

With Caltrain's new electrification set to kick off soon, I have been checking if there have been any additional signaling changes beyond the removal of the King St Terminal cantilever. While most of the action is happening north of San Jose Diridon, the wires do extend down to the Tamien Station, which has a direct VTA connection and has always seen a bit of through service. Here is what I found when I checked in on the Southern Pacific era signaling on that part of the line.

First up was CP-CAHILL and the southern end of the Diridon terminal. As expected these were replaced some time ago, getting the traffic light treatment in early 2017.

Next were the SP signals at CP-DELMAS about a mile to the south These lasted quite a bit longer, being replaced by US&S modular traffic lights around 2021-2022.

The most interesting changes occurred at CP-MACK at the Tamien Station. CP-MACK had southbound Sp masts, a northbound Sp cantilever and a northbound two "head", 6-module dwarf stack. Around 2021 the track two cantilever signal was changed from SP to Darth Vader type. Then later in 2022, both cantilever signals were replaced by two "head" LED searchlights. 

In an even more baffling turn of events the dwarf stack was replaced by a two "head" mini transit style signals. 

Your guess is as good as mine as to why, but its definitely something to see. As for the rest of the line to Gilroy and beyond, it appears to be unchanged.

Southern Pacific Cantilever Zapped by Caltrain Electrification

In a completely predicable turn of events, the iconic Southern Pacific cantilever mast that has guarded the southern approach to the 4th and Kin St terminal in San Francisco has met its demise sometime between March and October of 2023, likely in conjunction with the erection of overhead electrification wires. It has been replaced by three LED searchlight dwarfs.

I've noticed that starting with Amtrak's New Haven to Boston electrification. recent North American electrification projects have included far more overhead clutter than those seen in Europe. Specifically the use of solid overhead beams to mount the wire brackets as opposed to cable spans. Cable spans don't tend to block signal sight lines as much, allowing existing signal placements to remain.

Anyway, I'm not sure if the 4TH ST cantilever was scrapped or donated to a museum, but as one of the last of its type in daily service, its loss is significant.

A New Source for Railfan Window Videos

While trying to gather information for my recent SEPTA Unilens post, I discovered a newish railfan video channel with a large amount of up to date of front facing video content that can help with signaling research. Retired  Railfan Horn Guy has been crisscrossing the country shooting a mix of front window and standard videos with special emphasis on SEPTA and, more recently, Caltrain. The latter is particularly useful given the impending demise of forward facing views on that line.

The guy is based on Long Island so naturally there is LIRR content, but he doesn't seem to have the same level of access as some of the other LIRR specific video channels that I suspect have insider access. Anyway, its a fantastic channel and good resource to bookmark.

What's Up With RTD and Caltrain's Grade Crossings?

Ever since the Denver RTD A Line opened in 2016, it's been plagued by strange grade crossing issues that eventually resulted in human crossing watchmen being posted for a number of years followed by a regulatory battle with the FRA.  Since then Caltrain has reported similar issues with a new grade crossing activation system citing them as one reason for the delays in their new electrification project. This begs the question, WTF is going on with RTD and Caltrain that would involve trouble with grade crossing activation, a problem that has been solved for well over a century. 

RTD A-Line Crossing Guards in 2017

A Twitter threat got me to Google this issue and I found a communication filed with the FRA from Denver Transit Partners that appeared to answer most of the questions if one read between the lines a bit. If you've tuned into my PTC reporting before you might remember how the entire concept was lifted from a grade crossing safety technology and while that has had a lot of implications on the signaling side it also means that project planners and political leaders have a ready made tool they can use to "solve problems", chief among these being NINBY complaints about grade crossing related crossing delays. 

RTD A-Line WiMAX PTC/WCAS Antennas

To make some more technology connections the RTD commuter rail network uses a traditional pulse code cab signal based ATC system and as it is an isolated network one might assume it would look to use ACSES as its PTC solution as that's the best way to leverage the cab signal system and avoid issues with wireless data.  Well for some reason they decided not to go in this direction and the reason is likely tied to the desire to implement a Wireless Crossing Activation System (WCAS).

At this point you might be wondering why an isolated 80mph commuter rail line needs a Wireless Crossing Activation System.  Well I was also confused until I saw that Caltrain had gotten itself into the same trap. Anyone that has ridden Caltrain knows that it's crossings tie up a lot of congested downtowns, especially around station stops and while Caltrain is in the process of a pretty extensive grade crossing elimination project, it's pretty clear if one reading the WCAS capabilities outlined in the previously mentioned DTP document that local motorists have a pretty strong voice when it comes to a frequent (4tph+ all day) commuter rail line snarling downtown traffic. 

Typically the example to justify WCAS is one of differential train speeds.  A "snow" freight train will activate the gates longer than a "fast" commuter trains will. While that is technically true there are scores of rail mileage in the US where 80mph passenger trains are mixed with 50mph or slower freight trains wit no ill effect.  On systems like Caltrain or RTD the number of freight is so tiny as to render this a non-issue.  The real "problem" is stopping trains.  Trains stop adjacent to a crossing and then keep the gates down for the duration of the station stop.  In addition to the longer delay there is likely a psychological element with drivers being delayed by a train that is just sitting there.  I have been told that some commuter rail operators like SEPTA and the LIRR have made use of timeouts to more aggressively raise the gates during long station stops, but I have no first hand experience with these. What WCAS looks to do is to have trains approaching the crossing negotiate if they are stopping or non-stopping  and then the crossing system delays the crossing activation and uses the attached PTC system to protect the crossing using a temporary speed restriction of some kind. 

This sounds great, but remember we have wireless involved as well as general complexity so, in the case of RTD, if this process fails, the backup is to use the full length signal block to trigger the crossing, resulting in a 90 second activation time.  There are additional issues of stopping trains (or trains that need to stop) getting non-stop activations that again result in a longer than planned crossing activation.  This brings us back to the DTP submission.  They are upset because CFR Part 49 Section 225 specifies a minimum 20 second activation time and at no point has this ever been a problem, in their eyes the FRA is baselessly trying to prevent motorists suffering from a few seconds of extra delay here and there.  Unfortunately Section 225 also says that a crossing system has to function AS DESIGNED and any deviation is considered a crossing malfunction.  This means that if your crossing protection uses neon lights and an air raid siren they had better work even if those aren't generally used elsewhere. 

From the FRA's point of view, the WCAS systems (at least used by RTD) was designed to have a certain activation time, the implementation isn't meeting the design spec so regardless of the 20 second minimum activation time the WCAS is not operating as designed and is therefore in violation of the regulations, thus the watchmen.  Sure, there are safety considerations involved with inconsistent crossing times, but the real issue is the meeting a design spec that was driven by the political considerations of crossing delays. 

TLDR NIMBYs demand the lowest possible crossing latency, planners see their shiny new PTC driven WCAS tools as a way to placate the NIMBY's, the technology fails to live up to the promise and finally the FRA gets mad.  There are multiple points to "fix" this issue  The FRA can be more flexible, the politicians can stand up to the NIMBY's or maybe the technology can be simplified.  Whatever the ultimate solution hopefully this sheds some light on the problem. 

Bell Tolls for Caltrain's 1907 Signal Bridge

 Way back in 2004 when the San Francisco peninsular commuter rail service known as Caltrain was being modernized with new trains, new passing tracks and new signaling, only a few pieces of Southern Pacific era hardware was retained.  Perhaps the most spectacular of these was the 8 track signal bridge just north of the South San Francisco Station sources claim dates from 1907.

Needed to span a number of freight sidings, the signal bridge was evidently found to be in reasonable condition and subsequently fitted with two pairs of modern signals.  Unfortunately, 15 years later freight service on the peninsula has continued to shrink and a new electrification project has provided capitol money to re-build the South San Francisco holdout platfom and replace the century old lattice steel signal bridge with a modern cantilever. 

While the Bay Area's preservation mindset makes its likely that the signal bridge will avoid being sent to a scrap yard, the electrification project also makes it likely that the signal bridge will need to be moved elsewhere, perhaps to an existing museum, a Caltrain parking lot as an art installation or maybe just the purgatory of the former SP Bayshore shop and yard complex while the powers that be figure out what to do. 

Signs! Signs! Everywhere a Sign! - Western Passenger Roads

 It's been a while since my post on Western Freight Railroads, that that's due to the unfortunate situation that many of the commuter agencies that do operate track between Chicagoland and the West Coast put little or no effort into their interlocking signs.  This installment will attempt to cover the interlocking signs of Metra, the South Shore, Railrunner, Denver RTD, Coaster, Metrolink and Caltrain. 

Starting with METRA, it directly owns and operates those lines that were cast off from freight railroads where there was little or no freight service and/or a general bankruptcy and abandonment.  This consists of the Rock Island division, Electric Division and SouthWest Corridor. In all these cases it appears that METRA just stencils a barely legible name on the relay huts with black paint.



There is an exception to this on the Milwaukee District lines that are are jointly operated between METRA and Canadian Pacific. In this territory interlockings are provided with white on Metra blue signs.

In the Chicago Union Station area, Amtrak provides Conrail style white on blue signs, although the font isn't quite right.

One might have thought the Chicago South Shore and South Bend would use some sort of heritage inspired sign, however this is not the case with plain white black on white stick mounted signs located at the interlocking limits.

With its strong roots in transit instead of traditional railroads, Denver's RTD just labels its signals with a lever number and milepost.

Albuquerque RailRunner uses cute ATSF inspired  black border signs at interlockings as well as maintaining a few originals. 

 

 

While  LA Metrolink has gone in with the METRA style of not giving a damn.

However across the county line, San Diego Coaster has gone all in for a period correct ATSF black border type sign.

Last and least we have Caltrain that has gone in for the stencil method.  However the stencils are larger and more legible and Caltrain also provides secondary signs with the full interlocking name.arranged in a vertical format at every interlocking entrance.

Well that finishes my coverage of railroad "station" signs in the United States.  If I am able to get enough references I'll see if I can do the same for Canada.

Off Brand Modular Signals

Usually when a railroad has gone all in for modular color light signals they place an order for a GRS D type, a Safetran CLS-20 or whatever the heck US&S is selling, but sometimes your railroad might be looking at a weak 3rd quarter or is funded by the public sector.  In those cases you might want to go with one of the little guys because they are probably willing to sell that $10,000 aluminum box for $7,000.  In this case your major minor players are L&W, Harmon, something I think might be related to Harris Technologies and whatever is ripping off the CLS-20. 


First up, L&W Industries is based in rural Missouri and made some inroads with Union Pacific or its predecessors in the 1980's before being generally rejected for the Safetran.  It's current claim to fame is the LED searchlight still being bought by Amtrak for various terminal projects.  Noticeable by the  L&W logo I have found these in the wild from Virginia to Texas.

If you are looking to save some money by purchasing your signaling equipment from Harmon Industries, located near Kansas City, you will have to look elsewhere because they were purchased by GE in 2000.  However some of their signals can be encountered from time to time, specifically on the Amtrak Shore Line and Atlantic City Line.

If you see a logo that sort of looks like an H with a swoop, I think this may have been something related to Harris Technologies that also got swept up in a GE joint venture in 2001.  These also appeared on Amtrak and other commuter systems in the northeast and Caltrain. 

Finally we have this blatant CLS-20 knockoff that I encountered on the low budget Buckingham Branch that have the same clam-shell look, but no glass lens or even that many LED modules.  I'm not sure, but UP might also be investing in these bargain bin clunkers.

Well those are all the ones I can dig up at this time.  If any of you are aware of others please let me know in the comments!

2017 California Zephyr Trip Report

Time for another trip report. This will be my third time covering the California Zephyr Route after previous trips in 2012 and 2014. Unlike before I only rode the train between San Francisco and Denver, but there was quite a bit going on. However, let me begin with some Bay Area news.

On Caltrain the supplementary signal automatic signal locations have been placed in service since my last visit to the peninsula. This has resulted in some remarkably short (for North America at least) main line signal block distances. For example from Redwood City, one can count up to 6 Clear signals in a row in the southbound direction.



Over on BART, the replacement of transit type gooseneck Unilens signals has been gaining speed with the Millbrae complex having its supply replaced by generic traffic light types. However Unilens signals were still in service at a number of other locations.

In the Capitol Corridor a new station is under construction at Fairfield, CA, which will result in the replacement of a number of SP style target signals, however the remainder, including the searchlights at DAVIS, appear to be safe.

The CTC is now active on the Roseville Sub between Colfax and Switch 9, however no new interlockings have been added and a number of the old ABS signals have been left alongside the RoW with the heads turned.

Over the Donner Summit, classic signaling remains in service between Shed 10 and Norden. Elsewhere old SP signal bridges have been generally left in place. This is also true along the old reverse running section between Truckee and Reno with almost all the old center mount signal bridges having been left in place.

All searchlights on the Nevada Sub have been replaced, however the SP tri-lights are safe. WESO interlocking and the Elko sub have been re-signaled, however it appears that the old single direction ABS tracks have been converted to bi-directional ABS. Old SP and WP ABS masts have been removed.

On the former DRG&W route, everything has been resignaled except the stretch between Green River and Grand Jct. This retains the 1960's era DRG&W CTC and pole line. This is all the more remarkable as replacement signals have been up since 2012! However the seemingly safe stretches of searchlight signals on the Moffatt Tunnel Sub have been replaced. On approach to Denver both Utah Jct and Fox have retained classic Rio Grand signaling.

Finally, the new Denver RTD commuter rail uses a Metro North style Rule 562 system with *G* Cab Speed signals placed only at interlockings. Cab signal speeds are Restricting, 15, 30, 45, 60 and MAS with 15 being given departing terminals and Restricting heading into them. This indicates use of a 50ppm slow speed code instead of just relying on a 0 ppm code in all slow speed situations. Also, Amtrak LD trains using tracks 4 and 5 in Denver Union Station only get *R* Restricted Proceed entering the terminal interlocking from non-RTD tracks.

No Respect - The Safetran Unilens

While riding up the Caltrain Corridor I noticed a little something that once again reminded me that the Safetran Unilens signal, for all its seeming usefulness, is the ugly duckling of the signal world.  The Unilens series (now in its second generation) was created as a solid state replacement for the old fashioned electro-mecnahical searchlight signal.  Inside, instead of a moving colored filter, one will find four lamps each connected to a single (hence the name) lens via fiber optic cables. This seems like the perfect solution to the old problem of getting multiple colors out of a compact signal head, and in fact should have been a marked improvement seeing as each Unilens head could support 4 colors instead of three.

From the Greek, Uni meaning one and lens meaning lens.

 Not only could the Unilens play the role of a dwarf signal, it could also be used in mast mounts behind a circular target just like the older searchlight and in the case of close quarters transit applications the Unilens had an additional trick up its sleeve with a goose-neck attachment that allowed the lens  to be placed a foot or two away from the actual lamp housing.

Initially adoption was good with a number of traditional searchlit railroads, such as the Delaware and Hudson and Canadian Pacific, buying them as a simple replacement for the US&S H series and GRS SA's they had been buying for decades. The BART rapid transit system enthusiastically bought into the whole goose-neck configuration for its limited number of wayside signals

But then things took a turn for the worse.  Crews complained that the small internal lamps didn't provide a bright enough light and the lamps themselves were proprietary, expensive and prone to burning out.

You be the judge!

The Canadian roads that briefly used the Unilens in high signal applications switched over to Darth Vader style LED lamps, and the transportation authority that owns the Coaster route to San Diego actually took the step of replacing its high mounted Unilens signals with target configuration Safetran colorlights.

I am posting this because while passing by the BART Millbrae station I observed that the goose-neck Unilens signals, perhaps some of the only examples ever purchased for rapid transit, had been swapped out for bland and boring LED traffic light type signals.  No the Unilens isn't going the way of the position or searchlight signal.  CSX, SEPTA and BNSF still prefer them in close clearance signaling locations across their systems, but as a replacement for what was once the most common signal type in North America if not the world, the Safetran Unilens has fallen dismally short.

Speed Signaling with Caltrain

Between 2002 and 2004 the Caltrain commuter route on the peninsula between San Francisco and San Jose underwent a near total rebuild to bring it up to the same high tech standards as many of the companies that had their headquarters adjacent to its tracks. At the turn of the 21st century the line was operating much as it would have been at the turn of the 20th with basic single-direction Automatic Block Signal operation with hand operated crossovers at temporary block stations where orders would have hooped up to trains during single line working. Much of the line still used jointed rail and there were only five interlockings on the entire route clustered at the north end near San Francisco, one of which was the 4th and King St terminal and the three of the remainder being used by freight trains accessing spur tracks.

Fortunately for history the line was documented by a West Coast signal fan and you can see his work here.

http://www.redoveryellow.com/signals/coast/_C326-359.html
http://www.redoveryellow.com/signals/coast/_C360-381.html

Two years later the line could not be more different. It was upgraded to fully bi-directional CTC operation with welded rail and large sections with concrete ties. Stations were rebuilt and two long 4-track passing sections were constructed near the Northern and Southern portions of the line to allow new express train services to pass locals without delay. A plethora of new interlockings were installed to allow 2-track express passing or just easy recovery from engineering works. Again, all of these changes were documented by the same signal fan.

http://www.redoveryellow.com/signals/coast/after_ctx/_C326_358.html
http://www.redoveryellow.com/signals/coast/after_ctx/_C359-381.html

What is perhaps more interesting is that as Caltrain owned the tracks between CP-COAST and San Francisco it was free to make the decision to abandon the old Southern Pacific inherited 'route' signal rules and adopt more modern speed signal rules comparable to those seen in the east. As Amtrak had the long term contract to run the Caltrain services this better fit its operating practices elsewhere in the country.

The old route style signaling had been popular back when interlockings were few and far between and traffic densities light, but with increased routes and higher speed differentials Caltrain dumped the whole route concept and adopted a speed signaling scheme influenced by prior art, but with its own unique flavour.

The Caltrain signal rules can be found its the following rulebook documents. Also included are the Union Pacific route signaling rules still in service on the UP owned portions of track so you can compare and contrast.

Caltrain ETT No 2
Caltrain ETT No 2 Supplement No 4

So what is interesting is that Caltrain started with the typical "Northeast" style signal set with Y/Y as Approach Slow and *Y* as Advance Approach, but dumped the use of "bottom yellow" in Restricting signals, using *R* instead. With bottom yellows now free R/Y and R/R/Y could be tasked to Medium and Slow Approach. The system retains some Western influences with the Approach Restricting aspect and Caltrain also added some innovative new aspects such as R/*Y* as Limited Advance Approach, R/R/*Y* as Slow Advance Approach and R/Y/*R* as Medium Approach Restricting. They also logically extended the Northeast style system by using R/Y/Y as Medium Approach Slow.

Because no automatic signal aspect requires 3 heads (a problem caused by using Y/R/G for Approach Slow) Caltrain was able to adopt a uniform visual aesthetic for its signals (probably to the delight of its vendor, US&S) by fitting all standard block signals with 1 head, distant signals with 2 heads and interlocking signals with 3 heads. Each head in turn was fitted with all three lamps, if they were needed or not. This gives the engineer an easy way of identifying what sort of signal they are facing, even if it means Caltrain spent a lot more outfitting signal lamps that would never need to be illuminated. On some of the 4+ track home signal gantries this can lead to quite the interesting Christmas Tree effect, especially when flashing aspects are involved.

This brings us to our main feature. Back in March I was out in the Bay Area for a conference and I was able to capture video from the north-facing railfan window of a gallery car of the entire line. Now this consists of about 40 minutes worth of video showing nothing but Clear signals and is probably something you don't really need to see, however I later filmed a second partial run at night where my express train takes the Bayshore passing route for some reason which shows off some aspects other than Clear. Also in evidence are the numerous grade crossings (including pedestrian grade crossings at stations which the trains have to whistle for) and this really cool Southern Pacific era 8-track signal gantry that was fitted with new signals and left in place. In that same area you can also see the last hand operated crossovers on the line used by local freight trains to switch between goods sidings that straddle the main line.

The first video between Millbrae and Bayshore can be seen here:





There is a gap between the way caused by my camera batteries running out.

In the second video you can see the new Lunar White marker lights that were attached to the signals in the terminal area for some reason. The terminal is the only un-resignaled portion of the line retaining its original Southern Pacific searchlights and pneumatic point machines (possibly the only pneumatic points west of Kansas City) and the Lunar Markers may be to differentiate the special case terminal signals with the new speed signaling system.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy the video and see that converting to Speed Signaling is an achievable goal.