Sacramento Northern

Sacramento Northern Railway

A GE Steeplecab street-running in Yuba City, California in 1964
Reporting mark	SN
Locale	Central and Northern California
Dates of operation	1918–1983
Predecessor	Northern Electric Railway
Successor	Western Pacific Railroad
Track gauge	4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)
Headquarters	Marysville, California

The Sacramento Northern Railway (reporting mark SN) was an 183-mile (295 km) electric interurban railway that connectected Chico in northern California with Oakland via the California capital, Sacramento. In its operation it ran directly on the streets of Oakland, Sacramento, Yuba City, Chico, and Woodland and ran passenger service until 1941 and freight service into the 1960s.

The Sacramento Northern (SN) was an electrified interurban railroad in California that extended 183 miles from Oakland north to Chico. There were two branches, one to Woodland-Colusa, and the other to Oroville. The SN had been two separate interurban companies connecting at Sacramento until 1925. The Oakland, Antioch, and Eastern Railway was a trolley-wire powered line that ran from Oakland through a tunnel in the Oakland hills to Moraga, Walnut Creek, Concord, Pittsburg, to Sacramento. It was renamed the San Francisco-Sacramento Railroad briefly. The Northern Electric Railway was a third-rail powered line that ran from Sacramento north through Marysville-Yuba City to Chico. The train crossed the Sacramento River on the Red Gate Bridge. It was renamed the Sacramento Northern Railroad in 1914. In 1928, the two lines combined to become the Sacramento Northern Railway and came under control of the Western Pacific Railroad which operated it as a separate entity. An extensive multiple-car passenger service operated from Oakland to Chico until 1941 including providing dining car service on some trains. Passenger traffic was heaviest from Sacramento to Oakland. Freight operation using electric locomotives continued into the 1960s. The SN was a typical interurban in that its trains, including freight, ran on downtown city streets in Oakland, Sacramento, Yuba City, and Woodland. This involved multiple car trains making sharp turns at street corners and obeying traffic signals. Once in open country, SN's passenger trains ran at fairly fast speeds. With its shorter route and lower fares, the SN provided strong competition to the Southern Pacific and Western Pacific railroads for passenger business and minor freight business between those two cities. North of Sacramento, rail business was less due to the small town agricultural nature of the region with is small towns and by competition from the SP Railroad.

The original, 93-mile (150 km) route connected Chico with Sacramento. The original name of this line was the Chico Electric Railway (CERY), in operation from 1904 to 1905. CERY was sold in 1905, after a few months of operation, to the Northern Electric Railway (NER). The NER went into bankruptcy in 1914, and was acquired by a new corporation named the Sacramento Northern Railroad (SNRR).