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SITE NAVIGATION

Sacramento Valley Station History Overview

1912-1926: After War and Disputes-"the Most Modern Station"

Sacramento Valley Station History Overview

1912-1926: After War and Disputes-"the Most Modern Station"

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The Arcade Station built by the Central Pacific Railroad in 1879. This station served Sacramento for nearly 50 years.

The first piece of the new facility was the placement of the I Street Bridge that was completed in 1911. This bridge allowed the mainline freight traffic to continue to pass south of the large central shops, serve the Arcade station with a sweeping curve, but the main purpose of the bridge placement was to access a future new station in a subsequent second phase. The new station would be placed on the filled lake bed that the City granted the railroad in exchange for eliminating the putrid water body. With track platforms centered on the city street grid of what correspond with 4th and H Streets the “new land” was located directly at the edge of the burgeoning commercial district.

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Main Waiting Room opening day. It would be several years before the installation of the John McQuarrie mural.

However, the completion of the facility would have to wait for more than a decade due to the nationalization of the railroads during a time of war and disputes the subsequent protracted legal proceedings over the contol of the Southern Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad. World War I and the legal proceeding of the Interstate Commerce Commission prolonged the implementation of the new station and its facilities, but work resumed in the early 1920’s to prepare for the new station.

The celebrated San Francisco partnership of Bliss Faville Architects who had designed Espee’s San Francisco headquarters, were selected and design work commenced in 1924. After much fanfare, the station opened on February 27, 1926.

The facility was billed as “state of the art” and according to the Sacramento Bee, was "undesputably the most modern rail station on the Pacific Coast." The new station boasted three new butterfly-canopies covering three platforms serving six tracks. This new platform arrangement required a sharp curve on the east end to connect back to the mainline near 7th Street. Within this triangular perimeter were placed the passenger car servicing facility with a large wood coach shed that separated the depot from the industrial shops and freight mainline to the north. Standing at the north edge of the new passenger station, one would not have a clear view of the large industrial shops that we enjoy today.

View from Concourse to platforms with coach shed in the distance

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View from Concourse to platforms with coach shed behind passenger cars.

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