On a fine Saturday morning in mid-May 2002, I
was having a breakfast as usual in a country style eatery in San Jose with dozen
of friends, a ritual we performed every week for the last 15 years. The eatery
is on the west side of Monterey Highway, a road I traveled to work for two
decades and IBM's disk drive plant on the west.
I noticed an unusual train passing the tracks
by Monterey Highway. I cursed myself for not carrying my camera.
Later, when I was traveling the same road for
an errand, I found the same rake traveling in reverse, the locos were pushing
it.
I went home, grabbed the camera and stopped by
the tracks.
It was a rake to drop off welded rails.
CalTrain will introduce a high speed rail from San Jose to San Francisco in near
future and they wanted UPRR to upgrade the tracks.
The rake
Close up of welded rails
Another view of rake
Viewing north. My faithful buddy, Toyota truck is on the right.
Rails rolling on rollers.
Digging trench in ballast to accommodate rails.
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