Fred Klein, 2013
Caltrain took over the San Francisco peninsula commuter service from Southern Pacific in 1985. In 1980, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) began to subsidize SPs money-losing operation, and called the operation Caltrain. Starting in 1987, the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board managed and funded Caltrain. Hence the reporting marks JPBX. In 1985, Caltrain replaced SPs aging EMD GP9 locomotives with new F40PH diesels, and the gray Pullman 1955-vintage gallery commuter cars with shiny Nippon Sharyo gallery commuter cars. Caltrain adopted its current logo in 1997 and repainted the whole fleet, which is the train shown here. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caltrain
The line runs from San Francisco to San Jose with an extension to Gilroy, California. Trains are run in push-pull operation with a cab control in the last passenger car. Locomotives are always in the lead when leaving San Francisco. Trains are not turned but simply reverse direction. Trains are only 5 cars long because that is the maximum platform space in many cities. Many platforms such as Menlo Park are constrained between adjacent streets.
Modeling a Caltrain commuter train in N scale is now easy because Kato offers its F40PH locomotive in the current (2013) Caltrain scheme, and in 2013 Kato released its Nippon Sharyo passenger cars in Caltrain paint from its “Kobo shops” sub-brand. The Caltrain model car bodies are those designed for Chicago’s Metra and are not exactly the same car sides as Caltrain, but they are close.
A noticeable difference is that most Caltrain cars have 24 windows on each side, but each model has 20 windows on one side (24 on the other) and has a flat wall where the handicap bathrooms are located. A few Caltrain cars have the 20-window configuration (presumably newer cars equipped with modern handicap bathrooms). These 20-window cars have a blue handicap placard by each door. I believe every train now has at least 1 car with a handicap bathroom and 20 windows on one side like the Kato model. Other cars have 22 windows, and a separate, almost invisible, wheelchair door. The missing window could mark the location of a bathroom. See the 3 photos with different window configurations below. The original car order of the Nippon Sharyo cars was in 1985, a stronger American’s with Disabilities Act passed in 1990, and newer cars thus may have different window configurations to meet the law. The 1985 cars do not seem to have handicap bathrooms. This is speculation on my part to account for different window configurations. I cross the Caltrain tracks twice a day on my commute, but I do not ride Caltrain and am by no means an expert on Caltrain.
Sean
Augenstein reports “The
train sets with 2 cab-controls cars are actually realistic consists, in that Caltrain now puts 2 of the cars in every train, because the
cab-control cars are also the ones with bike racks, and more bike capacity per
train was needed. Besides the car furthest from the engine (obviously)
being a cab-control equipped bike car, the 2nd car of the train from the engine
is also a cab-control equipped bike car. The cab-side faces North also. Caltrain started
putting 2 of the cab-control bike cars in every train a few years back
(~2010?), I believe in response to demand by bike commuters. You'll
notice that the from of the engines have a yellow
square to indicate whether the train has two bike cars or not, and nowadays
that yellow square is always there. The other bike car location is fixed
in the train (always 2nd from the locomotive) so that bike commuters always
know where to line up.
“Besides the bike/cab-control
car locations being fixed, the 3rd car from the engine is always the car with
luggage racks (has a green icon next to door outside). I think the 4th
car from the engine is always the handicapped car (blue icon next to the door
outside), to line up with where the ramps on each station's platforms are.”
A 5-car train in the Palo Alto station in July, 2009. Photo by Fred Klein.
Two commuter trains in the Caltrain 1997 red-dot paint scheme.
|
prototype car |
prototype # |
maker |
model car |
model # |
prototypl? |
|
F40PH
diesel |
JPBX |
Kato |
F40PH
diesel |
903
Santa Clara |
yes |
|
gallery commuter car |
JPBX |
Kato |
gallery commuter car w/cab |
4022 |
almost |
|
gallery commuter car |
JPBX |
Kato |
gallery commuter car |
3852 |
almost |
|
gallery commuter car |
JPBX |
Kato |
gallery commuter car |
3860 |
almost |
|
gallery commuter car |
JPBX |
Kato |
gallery commuter car |
3863 |
almost |
|
gallery commuter w/cab |
JPBX |
Kato |
gallery commuter car w/cab |
4024 |
almost |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Some of the different window configuations
A Caltrain Nippon Sharyo cab-control commuter car in Gilroy in June 2012, train number 29, car number 4015. Note there are 24 windows on this side of car, and there is no handicap bathroom in this car. The yellow marker near the door indicates this car accommodates bicycles.
A Caltrain Nippon Sharyo cab-control commuter car in Redwood City in July 2013, car number 4026. Note there are 20 windows on this side of car. The missing windows may conceal a handicap bathroom. The blue marker near the door indicates this car is equipped for wheelchairs and has a handicap bathroom.
A Caltrain Nippon Sharyo cab-control commuter car in Palo
Alto in July 2009. Note the car side has 22 windows and has a wheelchair
access door next to the standard door. The missing windows may be to conceal a
restroom. This may be a 1985 car retrofitted after the 1990 American’s with
Disabilities Act.
Caltrain commuter train in the 1997 paint scheme
An F40PH locomotive and five Nippon Sharyo gallery commuter cars. The last car has a engineer’s control cab for push-pull operation. Kato included two cab controls when only one is actually used. If the locomotive is leading, the Caltrain red-dot logo is at the tail-end of the car on both sides. The first car behind the locomotive is reversed to show the 20-window side. The cab-control cars have yellow placards by the doors indicating they have bicycle storage. All Kato car bodies (unlike Caltrain) have handicap restrooms and 20 windows on one side.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caltrain
