Mobile Moment - King Street Station

This week I've been on jury duty in downtown Seattle. Imagine my excitement when the bailiffs announce a two-hour lunch break; and here we are so close to tracks and trains! I skinned out the door and into the rainy Seattle streets to do what any railfan would do - eat my sandwich while looking for trains with my Treo 750/Camera Phone in hand. Sure, the quality of the photos taken by the Treo aren't up to snuff compared to even the most rudimentary 35mm SLR cameras, but frankly with some tweaking the photos end up looking better than those taken with a disposable. Sometimes you have to separate yourself from the desire to always be 100% and spot-on; I would have liked using my Olympus but the Treo does fine for what it is.

Closest venue for my Mobile Moment was our own King Street Station, recently sold to the City of Seattle by BNSF for the princely sum of one dollar. This will allow Seattle to get state and federal grants for renovation that were not available when it was privately held by the railroad. In any case, the station was potentially a great place for me to catch some trains and take some pix during my lunchtime - rather than sitting cooped up in the Jury Room.

Seattle Times wrote a great news story in 2005 about it; Trains magazine also wrote a sensational article recently about King Street Station, done in the style of a hard boiled detective novel from the 1940s - presumably because the wet weather and dark winters. It left me wanting more, because the article focused more on the way it was written rather than what it was written about. Much has been written about this station, so it's pointless for me to reinvent the wheel. But I can take pictures and poke around. The above view is pointed north towards the two-track tunnel that runs under the city to the waterfront. Below, the camer is pointed south toward the sports stadiums.

4th Avenue S runs on the left-hand side in the photo. In this part of the city, the railroad is literally underneath everything. On the other side of 4th Avenue is what's left of UP's Union Station, which has now been renovated into the headquarters for Sound Transit. The UP and Milwaukee Road ran out of Seattle's Union Station on a "stub track," which means the trains essentially backed up to the station and took on passengers. UP did not run on its own track north of here.

At this point, you might be thinking "doesn't this chowderhead take photos of actual trains?" Well, the best ones for last:

Amtrak 457 is an EMD F59PHI. On this day it was providing power for Amtrak Cascades, with the control car at the other end. Just before I took this photo a couple of homeless people walked across the tracks and then disappeared into the concrete maze on the other side. Some people just never learn about crossing tracks.

90230, for some reason, is called a "Cabbage Car." Essentially an "engineless engine," 90230 functions as a control car for Amtrak Cascades trains. Power is on the other end, usually in the form of an F59PHI like the one above but painted differently.

No BNSF trains came through at all while I was there, which was long enough to relax, eat, snap some pix, and even get close to Amtrak 457. But as I left and walked back towards 3rd and Yesler I could here the all-familiar howl of a BNSF horn coming up the track. Oh well...I should have stuck around another five minutes but who knew? That aside it was a great way to spend my lunchtime. I now know how to navigate around there on foot, so I should be able to take my boys along for the next tour of King Street Station!

Until next time, see you trackside...