Train tracks

SteveC · Status: Offline

Reply To: Train tracks

Jason · Status: Offline

Does anyone know why the Alto tunnel re-opening idea never made it to fruition? I can guess a variety of obvious reasons -- money, neighborhood complaints, etc. But what's the actual postmortem on this subject? Anyone think it may ever come to be?

Jason

Jason · Status: Offline

Check this link out below to learn about when during the early '90s the Alto tunnel was under consideration for re-opening:

http://www.marinnostalgia.org/altotunnel.html

Meadowsweet Rich · Status: Offline

If you look off Meadowsweet in the block of 1054 towards the northeast you can see both sides of a built up area that is obviously manmade & is where the railroad must have had a small trestle to bridge a gulch, a house now sits on the east end of this trestle approach, but the area where it crosses the gulch is easily spotted.

Paul Penna · Status: Offline

Dewey;434 wrote: Later the county surveyor J.C. Oglesby improved those roads but for the most part merely widened and paved the routes made by Austin. He designed the beautiful matching concrete arch bridges at Corte Madera and Tocaloma. I think he was also the Larkspur town engineer for many years.

I actually met Mr. Oglesby, back when I was a kid, in the mid-50s. Larkspur being a small town, everybody knew everybody to some extent. I know we'd occasionally encounter him downtown, and Mother would stop and talk to him. In fact, I still have a pretty clear picture of him in my head. Even as a kid I could sense there was something anachronistic about him. Always in a suit of old-fashioned cut, a hat, rimless spectacles. Like an extra in a Laurel & Hardy film walked off the screen.

Dewey · Status: Offline

I'd venture that Camino Alto was an "modern" engineered road, whereas Sausalito Road was an old wagon track, steep in parts. Starting in the 1870s a county surveyor named Hiram Austin started to lay out the county road system and he replaced old routes that probably originated as trails with carefully surveyed grades. He designed Shoreline Highway, the old White's Hill grade and Drake Highway, and Fairfax-Bolinas Road, all built with careful grades easy for horse and wagon to get up and down. Later the county surveyor J.C. Oglesby improved those roads but for the most part merely widened and paved the routes made by Austin. He designed the beautiful matching concrete arch bridges at Corte Madera and Tocaloma. I think he was also the Larkspur town engineer for many years.

Paul Penna · Status: Offline

Dewey;430 wrote: OK, here's a map (1897) showing the older route (center) with the newer road (Camino Alto) to the west...

Makes me wonder what the benefit of constructing Camino Alto was. The Sausalito St. connection was already in place, and it looks less twisty-turny.

stingray · Status: Offline

When the train left Ross for San Anselmo the tracks went down the current Sylvan lane,and then comes the creek.Was there a cement or wood bridge,or a mini tressel?or trussel?cant remember how to spell that.It didnt share the cement bridge that we drive on now,did it?Seems a bit narrow for that.It would have to have a seperate bridge.

Dewey · Status: Offline

OK, here's a map (1897) showing the older route (center) with the newer road (Camino Alto) to the west, as well as the railroad and tunnel. Notice there's no 101 out there, and all the marshes. On the south end, that's East Blithedale running around the marsh at Alto; it goes right through it today. No Meadowsweet Dairy yet in Corte Madera.

Check out the Koch Luggage thread for a map of cool old stuff there!

Attached files

SteveC · Status: Offline

Thanks Dewey, for the train info, and the Sausalito St thing makes sense.

You can closely hike that route. There is a very short fire road from the end of Sausalito St to Scott Valley behind Edna Magiure School.

It would be great to know the exact route.

Dewey · Status: Offline

Yep, Paul, that's the place. It was the lowest pass over Corte Madera Ridge available at the time (early 1870s). Don't know who Collins was, probably a landowner. The whole summit is drastically altered by 101, actually, it's gone!

Do you know about the old county road, in use before Camino Alto? It was what is now Sausalito Street (get it: road to Sausalito) from Tamalpais Ave. over the ridge. That was the original road route.

Paul Penna · Status: Offline

Where exactly is Collins Summit, in relation to present-day landmarks? Is it where 101 crests the ridge between Corte Madera and Alto?

Dewey · Status: Offline

Steve, I have copies of old NPCRR survey maps that clearly show the route (too detailed and faded to post). You'll find other maps in "Redwood Railways" by Gilbert Kneiss (if the map hasn't been stolen out of the back envelope!) and in "Narrow Gauge to the Redwoods." There's a well-known old photo of Dr. Lyford's dairy on the east side of Strawberry Point with the tracks going through, and a popular picture of Sausalito with Tam in the background showing the long trestle to the Point. Virtually the entire route on the Point has been obliterated by development.

OK, I'll post a detail of the Kneiss map:

Attached files

SteveC · Status: Offline

Dewey, Where did you find that the train followed the east side of Strawberry ?

I guessed it was on the west side where Seminary Dr. is.

Dewey · Status: Offline

Hey Meadowsweet Rich,

You are right, the oldest NPCRR route (1874-1884) went behind the current CM library and behind what would later be Meadowsweet Dairy, up and over Collins Summit, then across a rather large trestle where Tiburon Blvd is now, then snaking along the east side of Strawberry Point to a long trestle to Sausalito. Joe Breeze has put the old route, carefully researched with help from me and others, on his latest edition of bike routes in Marin (not sure if it's out yet). I have some old maps but can't post them for various reasons. There are a few spots that are paved now, some on private property and much of it obliterated. The best place to see the original grade remnant is on the Tiburon side of Collins Summit, up behind where Ethan Allen is (was?). There's a nice stretch of original roadbed that passes behind some new apartments and soon disappears into the freeway cut; private property but accessible as of a few years ago. Richard Torney of Kentfield is another expert on this old route.

SteveC · Status: Offline

To follow the train through Ross, Walk the bike path from the COM parking lot off east side of Kent Ave. on the west side side of the creek. It comes out behind the Ross Post Office which was the train station. If you cross Lagunitas Ave, The train went where Sylvan Lane is now. But it dead ends before crossing the creek to SFD Blvd.

The San Anselmo train was on the current south bound side of Sir Francis Drake Blvd. north of Sylvan.

The Kentfied station looks like it was about where Woodlands Market is, With the tracks going through where the science building is now which was built where the previous football stadium was built after the train left.

Rosemary · Status: Offline

Dewey;360 wrote: Here's a map from 1897 that details the route thru Larkspur and Kentfield. The road depicted west of the tracks is Magnolia Ave., and Kent Ave. later paralleled the tracks up to Ross. The loop road heading west beneath the name "Tamalpais" is Woodland Road now. "Tamalpais" was the old name for Kentfield. Notice that a lot of the marsh has since been filled for development.

Check out my detailed relief map model of Ross Valley in 1900 at the Fairfax Library: it shows exactly where the train went and what the whole place looked like 100 years ago!

I think remember my mother telling me that the train had gone up along where Shady Lane is now. Her parents had a summer home in Ross, and she used to tell me how they took the train from Sausalito to Ross. (After taking the Ferry from San Francisco.) This would have been in the 19-teens. I think there are still remnants of the train bed along SFD between San Anselmo and Ross. Mother used to tell me about the houses they saw along the way, and that one of them had a fence with pickets carved like the seven dwarfs.

Meadowsweet Rich · Status: Offline

Hi Dewey, I've heard that the train ran just up the hill from the present day tamalpais ave in corte madera and along meadowsweet drive past the library & up meadowsweet to 'collins summit' where it went down to alto, that area is not shown in the map you posted, any chance of posting that section of the route? it's where I grew up & you can still see evidence of railroad having gone through there at one time if you look in the right places.thanks, rich.

Dewey · Status: Offline

Here's a map from 1897 that details the route thru Larkspur and Kentfield. The road depicted west of the tracks is Magnolia Ave., and Kent Ave. later paralleled the tracks up to Ross. The loop road heading west beneath the name "Tamalpais" is Woodland Road now. "Tamalpais" was the old name for Kentfield. Notice that a lot of the marsh has since been filled for development.

Check out my detailed relief map model of Ross Valley in 1900 at the Fairfax Library: it shows exactly where the train went and what the whole place looked like 100 years ago!

Attached files

stingray · Status: Offline

Thank you Rosemary,for that information.

Rosemary · Status: Offline

Hi Stingray,

The tracks always paralleled Magnolia on the east side. I used to walk them in the early 1940s to visit a girl in my class at LCM who lived past Escalle, just before where the hillside of Condos are now (On the West side of Magnolia.) The bike path today roughly follows where they were. But I don't remember where they went after that. The businesses on the east side of Magnolia, (where Dollars and Cents used to be, and Marvin Gardens) is where the tracks ran. But how they got past COM or to San Anselmo, I don't remember.

Edit:

I checked my old Sanborn Maps of Larkspur that I downloaded several years ago, but they only go to just past Post St.

stingray · Status: Offline

Train tracks