Beneath the Wraps

                I'm certain that I have over 80 posts in which I had used public transportation while living in Salt Lake City.   There is also a high volume mentioning driving or the car itself.   There is also an entire post dedicated to water transportation here .    Amusement rides may not count as transportation as they are thrills.   Riding trains at the park or the zoo takes passengers around - sort of a tour - in a circle back to where you started.                           My first experiencing with riding a passenger train (I'm assuming AMTrack) came when I was about seven or eight. My cousins had moved to Denver, Colorado for a couple of years and my mom and grandma had taken me and my brother, Patrick to visit for about a week I guess. I don't have man...

          I try to keep the room cool so I can fall asleep more easily.   Last night it was cold.   I still managed to sleep.   But I felt overly warm at 3:30 this morning.   When the heat kicked on I moved into the bathroom and stood by the window until the heat shut off.   I then wrote the following: From where I stand I can hear the traffic moving over I5 but I cannot see it Even if the fog wasn't there From where I stand I cannot see Old Pacific Highway I can barely see the street where I live From where I stand I can hear the trains I know the tracks were not completely abandoned But had never seen a train in Myrtle Creek until the other day when I went to meet my friends for coffee. I parked between Good Dogs and the park and I saw the train passing the tracks where Jenna and I have explored and taken several pictures. From where I stand I somehow seem ...

            A week after Jenna’s first art class had finished, UTA had a problem when one of its trains derailed downtown.   The same train we would have been on had we still been commuting downtown. I guess it wasn’t just UTAs problem, but anyone driving that particular path downtown.   It appears that it was covered by all of the media during some point of day.   But I hadn’t heard about it until after 6:00 p.m.   I guess by then it had become “old news” and I didn’t know anything more about it until the following day when I typed “UTA derailment” on Google.               The Tribune article was the first one that I came across.   Comments can be submitted and read at the end of the article. Many hurtful comments were made toward UTA and thus UTA passengers, but just as many had come to the defense of UTA and those ...

            Jenna had taken an art class last week. We’ve been taking TRAX of course.   It’s funny about that form of transportation.   Streetcars could be seen in downtown Salt Lake back in the late 30s.   I don’t know when the city decided to rip all the rail lines out.   So many changes have taken place through the years. For over half a century the streetcars and rails had been done away with in downtown Salt Lake. The garage that had been used to house the trolleys has since been turned into a shopping center. Meanwhile the rails have been re-dotting the Salt Lake map for the last two decades. Some existed from when the Union Pacific was built (I think) but most have been added by Utah Transit Authority. The Union Pacific Building gradually changed from cargo trains to Amtrax.   (I remember having gone to it a few times to meet my grandma) The building   is now the...

From my childhood, I remember seeing and hearing trains.   I remember being excited whenever a train would pass on the road and we would have to stop and wait for it.   My brother, Patrick, and I would often count how many cars were on each train.   My parents didn’t seem to be as excited whenever the arms of the railroad came down. A child’s perspective is so much different than that of an adult.   Mostly what we saw were cargo trains.   There were few encounters with passenger trains.    My grandma who lived in San Francisco would sometimes take the train.   We would go to pick her up downtown at the train station.        Patrick and I had also ridden on a train from Utah to Colorado.    We’d gone with my mom and my other grandma. I thought that it was exciting!   Especially going through tunnels.   And there were some LOOONNNGGG tunnels.   As I got older, I don’t recall...

          Jenna and I were blessed with good weather on Wednesday as we took public transportation ALL DAY.            My initial plan was to catch the train near where we live – but Roland took us to the location near the library – which right now is the end of the line – and we were waiting for the train on the wrong side.  No big deal.  There was no time destination on our part.  We were free to ride all day.           We got off the train to transfer to the bus.  My initial plan was  to get off after the bus passed I-215 – but the driver said that the construction forbid the busses to stop between the two main streets.  So Jenna and I ended up walking a lot further than I had anticipated . . . we might as well have just stayed on the train.          ...

          I don’t know when or why I came to be freaked out by railroad tracks.   I remember liking railroad ties when I was a kid – not that I ever got that close to one.   I don’t think I did.   Trains and tracks were usually seen from a distance.   Except for maybe crossing them.   I don’t recall being so quite bothered as a kid.           I really don’t know when or why it bothers me to cross the tracks – but it does.   Perhaps not so much on foot as it does when I’m driving.   Not when I’m a passenger – but only when I’m the actual driver.   There is nothing devastating that happened in my lifetime to make me feel so uneasy – but I am.   Even if they’re tracks that haven’t had trains on them for decades.           As a child I had been fascinated by trains.   I remember watchi...