Railpictures.net has a photo of the work in progress around tunnel ten so that sidings at Walong and Marcel can be joined, making another section of double track on this busy route.
Ken, if you read my shared post on Facebook, Railpictures answered with the original doubling plans until the bean counters realised the cost, so work is cut back for now to shorter sections. I understand tunnel ten will not be daylighted.
I don't know my Tehachapi tunnels well enough. Is tunnel 10 the tunnel just railroad east of Walong? Isn't that private property above there? There used to be a dirt path from the road out to a rock outcropping above the tunnel. Most of that was graded a few years ago for someone's vacation home, then work stopped. I guess what I'm saying is who owns the land above a tunnel?
Ken, try this link to their FB page. Comments are below the picture. https://www.facebook.com/RailPictures.Net
That is the tunnel east of the loop, and about 200 feet higher. I remember hiking put to it and taking photos above it.
With the way they've dug it out, kind of has the look of a model under construction. Like putting the portal in place and then scenicking around it...
They could be extending both tracks of Walong siding around the curve. That siding has always been too short to pass most trains. Wonder if they'll extend it to Marcel? But then the whole hill is going to be double tracked someday.
Forget about mergers having anything to do with Tehachapi. BNSF built the third track over Cajon so why not double track Tehachapi. They use the pass more than UP does & they wouldn't care at all if BNSF paid for it. And SP let Santa Fe paid for raising the tunnels for all their double stack traffic.
I highly doubt the entire hill will be double tracked. There are at least two sites on the historical registry that would prevent this, one being the loop itself, which is protected from any alignment changes through tunnel 9.
There's no guarantee that any historical registry will preserve Tunnel 9 in perpetuity. Even sites on the National Register of Historic Places have been compromised for the sake of the economy.
Ah, yes. Such as Burlington Northern and their famous "Midnight Bulldozer". A fine example was when they came in during the middle of one night, unloaded a dozer, flattened the Wenatchee, Washington depot, loaded it up and were gone by daybreak. Other than unhappy citizens, there were absolutely no repercussions for this marvelous deed.
