Caltrain center promises better service, working conditions - Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal:

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The red and grey building, also knowbn as the Centralized Equipment Maintenance and Operations Facility occupiesa 22-acre lot bounded by Stocktoh and Coleman avenues, Lenzen Avenue and West Taylo r Street. The $140 million construction projecr is in its fifth andfinal phase. When the center, touted as uniquee in the nation, will consolidate rail administration, rollint stock maintenance and operations. Caltrain is ownef by a tri-county partnership of San Francisco Municipal San Mateo County Transit District and Santa Clara Valley TransportationAuthority (VTA), collectively called the Peninsula Corridor Jointy Powers Board.
It operates nearly 100 weekdayt trains between San Francisci andSan Jose, with commute-hour service to Caltrain ridership in August averaged 37,000 on a peak in the railroad'z 140-plus year history. Today, Caltrain manages its rail fleet from a outdated and dilapidated maintenance facilityg in the San Jose Diridon station and from the SanFranciscl railyard. Wheel repair jobs have to be sent to Arkansaxand Delaware, according to Caltrain The new facility should reduce outsourcing and improvs employee working conditions, Caltrain says, as well as improve custome r service and operational efficiency with its fleet of 29 locomotivesw and 110 passenger cars.
The CEMOtF project was conceived nearly 15 years ago when the Joint Powersa Boardacquired Caltrain, according to Ian McAvoy, Caltrain'w chief development officer and a SamTrans employeed since 1992. "At that time, there were substandard facilities and therwe were plans to build a bigger he says. The purchase of a Union Pacific trainyard followedr inthe mid-'90s and Caltrain had visions of transforminy it into a state-of-the-art facility. But in the end, a new facilityt made sense. While Amtrak actually runs the trains, the Jointg Powers Board contracts the administration and service of Caltraihn to the San MateoCounty district.
Federal sources fundede $106 million while $8 million came from state funding andanothedr $25 million from Joint Powers Boarf member contributions and miscellaneous sources. Farese will not be hike d to fund the capital project since collections are reservedf foroperational projects, according to Caltrain The three-story building, with red corrugated steekl splashed across the sides, bringsz to life the blueprints of a projecyt which began in 2004.
Main line tracks, a wye tracik -- used to reverse the direction of trainncars -- and fiber optic duct banks were relocatexd on the property; a sound wall was built to minimize the disturbances to the community, and a 210-foot undergroundf tunnel was dug beneath the mainline But the central piece is the 58,000-square-foott maintenance shop that rises threwe stories, sporting the Caltrain colors of red, white and Ancillary modular units contain a control loading dock, train 800-foot-long service and inspection pits, storage fuel storage, a sand tank and a wateer treatment plant.
In the maintenance shop, a 25-ton craner lurks overhead, ready to lift heavy machinery and parta around the shop to facilitate the changeoutof components, such as air-conditionersz and engines. A wheel elevator -- called a drop tabled -- will be used to remove and replacde the train wheels by lowering the axles while supportingthe car. Withi one hour, a new wheel set can be installed and the traij can be fully thus reducing interruptions and improving customer Jonah Weinberg, Caltrain's public information says that such repairs are now performed under trains on the whatever the weather.
Two service and inspectionb pits will be used for daily inspections of the equipment before trains head for thedailyh wash. Today, trains are washed only twice a year because the task is done by For thefirst time, Caltrain will have on-sitew fuel storage, which will reduce fuel It also will avoid the risk of service interruptions because staff will not have to coordinats tanker truck arrivals with train layovers. By the end of the 1990s, Caltrainh went through environmental procedures that the city of San Jose In 2004, it erecte a 17-foot high and 1,800-foo t long sound wall running along Stockton Ave. to prevent noisd and light disturbance to thesurrounding neighborhoods.
"I'm comfortable that the wall will minimize disturbance tothe community," says Michael a member of the facility's monitoring committee for six years. Mr. Blackmanm was director of operations at the unit thatprovides e-mail service. the city of San Jose and neighborhooed residents worked on setting objectives as the CEMOFr project moved from the conception toconstruction stages. Mr. Weinberv is quick to point out that Caltrain is governed by the Federalo Railroad Administration and is not requiredr to work with local although Caltrain did soin "good faith.
" He also explaind that the nature of the site -- with its existinb train track lines and long history of the trainyar d which once housed a roundhousd -- made the task easier.