Photograph by Willys Peck
Engine 2476 pulls the morning commuter train out of Congress Junction on March 29, 1956, traveling through blossoming orchards and yellow mustard blooms.
Saratoga Stereopticon
Saratoga had its day in the sun-train-wise
By Willys Peck
If, as some maintain, I have a one-track mind, then it's the track that runs through Congress Junction and Azule Crossing. Continuing in a metaphorical vein, if I am beating a dead horse, then it's an iron horse. All of which has to do with a current hot topic, the Bay Area Rapid Transit District, or BART. Come November, we'll be voting on a sales tax measure that would extend BART from its Fremont terminus to San Jose.
There are a couple of things about BART that make it different from other rail transit systems. First, the high-speed electric trains derive their power from a semi-enclosed third rail running about a foot aboveground. This precludes conventional, surface grade crossings; either BART or the highway has to go above or below the other. BART, it should be noted, has a lot of underground mileage, such as under San Francisco Bay, and there would be some in a San Jose configuration.
Another BART distinction is its five-foot track gauge. Standard-gauge rails are four feet, eight-and-a-half inches apart, so there would be no interchange of rolling stock between BART and Caltrain's Peninsula service. I have always been intrigued by the basis of the standard-gauge track width. Why four feet, eight-and-a-half inches? The story goes that U.S. lines adopted the track width used in England, the birthplace of railroads, and the Brits, early in the 19th century, based their track width on the grooves left on stone-paved roads by ancient Roman chariots. We're talking tradition here, and BART isn't into chariots.
So what has all this got to do with Saratoga? Well, I'm making what may be a risky prediction. I'm saying that BART will never run a line to or through Saratoga. Risky? Look at the Wright brothers. Back in December 1903, who would have thought that their kite-like contraption would have led to supersonic passenger travel on a Concorde? But that's exactly what happened.
Anyway, from a historical perspective, Saratoga has had its day in the sun, train-wise. It lasted from 1908 to January 1964, when Southern Pacific commuter trains ran through Saratoga en route to San Francisco. The remnant of that line is the one traversed by freight trains running from San Jose to the Kaiser Cement Corp. plant in the hills behind Monta Vista. The stretch from Monta Vista to California Avenue in Palo Alto, where the branch connected with the main SP line to San Francisco, was needed for the Foothill Expressway, so, no more commuter trains.
Congress Junction is a spot that deserves some sort of historical marker. The small waiting station there would have been about in the middle of the Saratoga Avenue-Highway 85 interchange, making location of an appropriate place for commemoration something of a problem. The crossing's name had to do with Congress Springs, which accounted for Saratoga having its name, and the junction of Southern Pacific and Peninsular Railway interurban tracks. Commuters caught the 6:49 a.m. train to San Francisco, where they arrived just over an hour and a half later. Coming back, they caught the 5:17 p.m. train from San Francisco.
Just past Azule, which also had a small passenger shelter, the train stopped at the Prospect Road crossing, where famed San Francisco newspaper editor Fremont Older caught the train every day.
Where the track paralleled the highway, train passengers could lean back, peruse their morning newspapers, look out the window and feel sorry for the motorists jammed in freeway traffic. I liked that old SP advertising slogan: "Next time try the train--and relax."
We'll never see the old commuter trains again, and most likely we'll never see BART. But don't forget what happened with the Wright brothers.
Saratoga, California Since 1955
