Just northwest of San Luis Obispo, the railroad makes a horseshoe curve at Goldtree and headed up to the top of the hill at Cuesta. The actual curve is behind a prison and is not easy to get to. The Coast Starlight (Coast Daylight before Amtrak) has just come around the horseshoe curve and is crossing the trestle over Stenner Creek. The descending grade increases here from 1.9 percent to 2.1 percent. SDP45s 3207 and 3209 lead the train on February 13, 1974. This part of the Coast Route, from the west end of San Luis Obispo to east end of Santa Margarita received CTC in August 1942. The rest of the Coast Route remained under train orders until replaced by DTC in the 80s.

When Amtrak took over passenger operations in 1971, the Starlight was still called the Coast Daylight and operated all the way to San Diego. The southbound (railroad eastbound) was scheduled to leave San Luis Obispo at 2:05PM. If all was on schedule it would meet the northbound train at Grover (the first siding east of San Luis Obispo). The northbound train was scheduled to leave San Luis Obispo at 2:57PM. Note that the steam generators on both engines are working.

Coast Route Index

Train LAWJZ at Cuesta