Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops Overview And History

The Southern Pacific Railroad Sacramento Shops were the largest and most comprehensive railroad heavy repair facilities in the Western United States. In addition to repairing locomotives and railroad cars, the unusually self-sufficient Sacramento Shops built new ones from the ground up as late as 1937. [1] This page offers an overview of the evolution of the Sacramento Shops from its beginning through the transformation from steam to diesel as recorded in Historic American Buildings/Historic American Engineering Record Survey CA-3100. Left-click on the images to open the full-size image file. You can then either zoom into the page to read the content, or right-click on the image, choose “Save Image As” and choose a spot on your computer to which to download the file to review or print at your leisure. Any print shop with an architectural printer can print them full size.

Click the link to return to the Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops Main Page from which pages detailing each building may be visited.

Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops overview
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops site plan
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops site evolution
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops repair area evolution
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops rolling stock construction and repair area evolution 1869 - 1898
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops rolling stock construction and repair area evolution 1917 - present
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops steam locomotive repair 1895
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops diesel locomotive repair 1965
Southern Pacific Sacramento Shops moving locomotives

[1] Historic American Engineering Record Survey HAER CA-303-E This project, completed in 2001-2002 was prepared by historians Carolyn Dougherty, LeeAnn Bishop Lands, J. Lawrence Lee, and Camille Vicenti. Overview plans were delineated by Joshua A. May, Elena Vuncheva, Emily Duchek, Elizabeth Dubin, Pete Brooks, and Dana Lockett. Photos were made by Jet Lowe.