Milepost 1147.2 is a location on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad's Stockton Subdivision that runs between Calwa (Fresno) and Richmond, California. It also happens to be the point at which our house is located in Oakley. No, we don't live under the tracks, but our back fence sits about 50 feet north of the mainline at the Big Break Road grade crossing — Milepost 1147.2.
Because it is an important link between the Bay Area and the rest of North America, the Stockton Sub sees a fair amount of rail traffic, sometimes more than 25 freight trains a day. It also serves as part of Amtrak's San Joaquin line, with eight passenger trains passing through daily. It is an ideal place for a day of railfanning, and our goal with this site is to share some of the sights, sounds and other details that make our area special.
Although our eventual goal is to offer information and images on the entire Stockton Sub, our major focus is on the segment that extends between Stockton and Pittsburg. Those are the areas we frequent most often and know best, so it is only natural that we have more information on them. If we have not included an area that you are interested in it does not necessarily mean we haven't been there, only that we haven't gotten around to updating the web site. (We enjoy adding to the site when we can, but it is not our primary mission in life.) If you have suggestions, or items to contribute, feel free to e-mail them to us. We always appreciate feedback.
For those wondering, the sound you may have heard when you opened the main page is a talking defect detector, common on most Class 1 rail lines in North America. If you have a radio scanner you can listen to the various messages the detectors deliver to the train crews. There is no detector located at Milepost 1147.2, so we created one using recordings of detectors once owned by Southern Pacific. To hear the sound again, click here.
And finally, a note about the images and sounds contained on this site. We invite you to download anything you find here for your personal use. In fact, we encourage it. Because we find it extremely annoying when photographers junk up their images by placing copyright info on them, we have generally refrained from doing so. What this means is that we are putting you on your honor that you will not reproduce these photos without giving us proper credit. If you would like to post them to your web site or elsewhere, that's fine with us, just please remember to clearly attach our name somewhere. (All of the images in this site have been credited at the end of each caption.) It would also be great if you could drop us an e-mail to let us know where our work will appear so we can create a link to your site or otherwise see the finished presentation. Thank you for your consideration.
Thanks again for stopping by Milepost 1147.2 and enjoy.
We welcome your comments and suggestions. Please send e-mail to Glenn or Roni Gehlke.
Proceed to Milepost 1147.2 on main track. Hold main track at last named point. Over.
This page was last updated Friday, March 26, 1999 at 00:43 hrs.