Railfanning Riverside - Downtown - 1/8/17

On a rather very clear and early Sunday morning, while on my way to Orange County, I decided to spend the early to mid morning railfanning the Riverside - Downtown station knowing that I had a good amount of free time for the morning part of this Sunday. This was also in continuation after railfanning all the stations along the Perris Valley Line as well as closing up some of the other Metrolink lines I have railfanned. This station in particular is of great interest to me mainly because I have travelled by this station and seen it many times ever since I lived in SoCal, but I have yet to railfan here until today. This station has lots of activity stemming from the Metrolink trains, the BNSF San Bernardino Subdivision, and the Union Pacific Los Angeles Subdivision, although no UP freights were seen during my time here. The station also serves as a layover /storage facility for weekday Metrolink trains, seen parked throughout the west side, and to the north of the station as well. From the time I arrived until I left, trains were almost continuous with a maximum of thirty minutes between trains. The security here was also very nice and even informed me about the Metrolink 91 / PVL train movements from the storage yard. Typically on weekends, all departing Metrolink 91 / Perris Valley Line trains originating from Riverside - Downtown (#751 & #753) are stored in the yard northeast of the station. All in all, this is certainly one of the more interesting and action packed stations I have been to ! Whether it was the horn action, the frequency of trains, or even the train movements from the yards, it was definitely worth finally checking out after so many years !

Train 1 : Metrolink #857 with CabCar #644 & F59PH #872.

Train 2 : BNSF Q-LACHOU2-08A with ES44DC #7550, ES44C4 #4202, #4201, & C44-9W #4362. Sorry for the clipped shots of Metrolink #857 & the BNSF intermodal meet. Had to conserve battery power for the time being.

Train 3 : Metrolink #751 with CabCar #676 & F59PHI #879. This is one of the two 91 / PVL trains originating from Riverside today, seen departing the storage yard to pick up passengers.

Train 4 : BNSF Q-LACALT4-08A with ES44DC #7456, C44-9W #5245, ET44C4 #3839(DPU), & ES44C4 #7179(DPU). Just as Metrolink #751 departs, BNSF Q-LACALT4-08A rounds the corner heading north.

Train 5 : BNSF Q-HOULAC3-07A with ES44DC #7669, & ES44C4 #8171. Literally as BNSF Q-LACALT4-08A disappears around the curve north of the station, Q-HOULAC3-07A approaches the station ! Awesome engineer on this train with some horn action as well !

Train 6 : BNSF S-STLLAC1-06A with ES44C4 #8378, C44-9W #4125, #4033(DPU), & ES44C4 #6728(DPU). Literally tailing behind, BNSF S-STLLAC1-06A appears just minutes after Q-LACALT4-08A passed. Nice horn action from the crossing to the north as well.

Train 7 : BNSF U-LACSEA3-08T with ES44DC #7716, SD70ACe #9118, C44-9W #4353, & ES44DC #7740. Pretty friendly crew on this train.

Train 8 : Metrolink #753 with MP36PH-3C #888 & CabCar #663.

Train 9 : BNSF Z-CHILAC7-06L with ES44C4 #6614, #6791, C44-9W #4647, ES44C4 #7949, & ES44DC #7333. Definitely a hot shot intermodal !

Train 10 : Metrolink #859 with CabCar #680 & F59PH #852. Nice horn action upon departure.

Train 11 : Amtrak 3 (Southwest Chief) with P42DC #192, & #184 (Phase IV Heritage Unit). This train was running approximately two hours and thirty minutes behind schedule. Right as the train begins to depart, the train goes into EMERGENCY ! It turns out that the crew have had some difficulty with the Surfliner coach all the way from Chicago regarding the air brakes fully releasing. This issue was also partly due to their late arrival into Riverside. Pretty cool engineer though !

Thanks for Watching !