Seventy-nine years ago this month Southern Pacific’s Suisun Bay Bridge, crossing Carquinez Strait connecting Contra Costa and Solano counties, had its official opening. It was the longest double-track span in the west and eliminated the use of two large railroad ferries. The ceremonial crossing was made by the railroad’s first locomotive, the C.P. Huntington, a 4-2-4 tank locomotive which is currently displayed at the California State Railroad Museum. It was followed by the railroad’s most modern locomotive of the time, 4-8-4 #4408. The pier in the foreground was for the Mountain Copper Company which had a smelter there. (This was the basis for the name of SP’s Mococo Line between Martinez and Tracy.) The bridge is now flanked on both sides with highway bridges.
This is a view looking west-northwest toward Mountain Copper Company’s smelter plant before the Suisun Bridge was built (town of Benicia is in the background across the strait). Obviously, a major byproduct was fertilizer. The area was an important agricultural producer of grapes/wine, fruits, nuts, etc. the first half of the twentieth century until the coming of suburbia.
It’s still one of the most imposing railroad structures I’ve ever seen. I remember my first trip over it when I was about 7 or so, heading to San Francisco to visit my aunt. I stood at the window of the car just shaking while we traversed it–I didn’t think that bridge would EVER end, LOL!
I’ve got a video of a 'Deck" pulling a long freight train across the bridge during WWII with a baggage-combine bringing up the rear. Seems that SP was having a caboose shortage at the time and was using older passenger cars between Oakland and Roseville.
It’s a really spectacular bridge. Unfortunately it’s not that easy to see these days, what with the two parallel highway bridges cutting off most of the view. But it sure has done the job over the past 79 years.
Wow… is that the same bridge I travel over from Davis to Emeryville? Now I am really gonna be nervous. [;)]
Beautiful. [bday]
They really missed the boat by not incorporating a rail across the new Bay Bridge. Wouldn’t it be cool to go from Sacramento to SF and not have to ride BART or the bus across the bay.
As an aside. I love the little terminal in Martinez. What a cool place.
There once was a double-track route across the Bay Bridge to accommodate electrics. The tracks and the road for trucks and buses were on the lower deck while cars used the upper deck. I was in second grade (1954) when I saw them. It was a “transportation day” school outing. It began by boarding heavyweight coaches pulled by a Pacific from Martinez to Richmond, there boarding a bus and traveling on the ferry from Richmond to San Rafael, over the Golden Gate Bridge to San Francisco, and then returning via the lower deck of the Bay Bridge. The tracks and ferry have been long gone.
This photo shows the Richmond terminus of the Richmond/San Rafael car ferry showing room for three ferries at a time, and with the bridge nearing completion. The ferries stopped running on August 31, 1956. In the background to the left is Mt. Tamalpais on which the “Crookedest Railroad in the World” climbed.