Bayshore Yard

Unfinished History

The Southern Pacific railroad's Bayshore Yard on the landfill on Brisbane Lagoon, c. 1920.

Photo: OpenSFHistory.org wnp26.1330

Southern Pacific Bayshore train yard, looking north from south of City Limits, 1946.

Photo: OpenSFHistory.org wnp 14.3444

March 8, 1905 view north from Visitacion Point, Brisbane. The first hill across the water was flattened for bay fill that became the Southern Pacific bayshore railyards.

Photo: OpenSFHistory.org wnp27.6366

Young men at work for Southern Pacific.

Photo: Regina Alioto

Northerly view from above San Bruno Mountain with railyards and San Francisco dump in foreground, SF city limits not far north of the bottom of the photo.

Photo: San Francisco Planning Commission

Northerly view of Caltrain tracks at Brisbane overpass, 2020.

Photo: Chris Carlsson

The Bayshore yard in 1983, with train traffic, straddling the political boundary between San Francisco and San Mateo counties.

Photo: courtesy Reg McGovern

In 2021 the old Southern Pacific roundhouse that facilitated train assembly in the Bayshore Yards is the only remnant left. While officially closed, it is not hard to enter the grounds on foot. Southern Pacific had another roundhouse in Mission Bay too.

Old Southern Pacific roundhouse, long abandoned, in Bayshore train yard, 2010.

From inside the old SP roundhouse, 2010.

Photos: Chris Carlsson