If You're Vacationing in the Ft. Myers, FL Area ...

[P5se Camelback]

Is all of Cajon pass on the upper level? I would have thought that San Bernardino would have been on the lower level with Cajon Pass being used to reach the upper level and from Summit on being on the upper level.

Russ, it's been a long time since I lived in California - 27 years. When I did live in the "southern part of the state," it was in Redondo Beach. I never made it over to San Bernardino, Cajon Pass or Victorville. I do have much to learn about the Santa Fe ... I have spent my modeling years avoiding it like the Plague! [I traded, as an even trade, a brand new AHM brass Pacific that was a Christmas gift from owner of the hobby shop I was managing for a vintage, 1948 brass and Zamac Reading G1sa Pacific that was in pieces!!] But I just spent about an hour and 10 minutes on Google Earth checking out the BNSF route from San Bernardino through Cajon Pass to Victorville as a little background homework prior replying to your question. Again, I'm no expert! But, here goes.

Our Club's Upper Level (called Division 1) goes from LA (in staging) to San Bernardino, where there is the roundhouse, turntable, diesel house, servicing for both types of motive power, a five track yard (about six or seven feet long) and the San Bernardino Depot (which has four tracks. Trackage then heads east (north) through Cajon and then climbs through Sullivan’s Curve and Cajon Pass to Summit, where there is a “pocket” for Helpers. From there, the track continues on to Victorville. Based on what I learned during my short fact-finding mission, that is the route followed by the prototype.

Beyond Victorville, trains continue east towards La Junta or Denver and points east to Chicago using the helix and exiting at the Lower Level (The Joint Line) to travel to Denver, or continuing down the helix to the very bottom level, containing four (or five, I can’t remember) tracks for staging, each one long enough to hold two complete staged trains. Their locations are managed utilizing optical sensors, as the only way to physically watch your train on that level is to sit on the floor and scrunch down. The optical sensors work extremely well. They are also installed at intervals along the helix and each one lights an LED on a panel mounted on the fascia, which is labeled as one of the cities or towns along the route to Chicago, so you can tell when you are approaching your final destination down through the helix and into staging by watching the LED's light in progression.

I am unsure why you expected the route that you described … but as Walter Cronkite used to say, “That’s the way it is …”