Salt Lake City Trax Day and Night

Here are some pictures of the sights around the Salt Lake City Trax trains, a couple during the day and some at night.

This mural is on the west side of the tracks at 3030 South. 

I took this on Sunday morning. When I arrived, several UTA maintenance trucks were parked along the cement barrier at the end of the street, and a gate in the fence was open. Five or six workers came through the gate, and I mentioned that they had a large crew. One guy said, "Yeah, next Sunday is switch inspection." The switch at the end of the street looked freshly painted. 

I think the man in the mural is Polynesian. 

Stupid Trax Workers

Randy and I came back Monday to take some night photos with the trains streaking past the mural. This was the last picture I got, because some persnickety train drivers possibly complained to someone, and two maintenance workers in two pickup trucks zoomed down our dead-end street with their high-beam headlights and bright rooftop lights flashing (similar to police lights but white). At first I thought they were transit police, especially after one cop kicked me off a cement barrier near 53rd South a few weeks ago, "Because every train driver is going to call me and tell me that someone is about to jump in front of the train," even though 20 feet of dirt and weeds separated me and a heavy chain-link fence that separated people and the tracks.  

The maintenance workers on Monday told us that my little built-in camera flash (Randy didn't use his) was blinding the train drivers (as if these workers' lights weren't 60 times brighter* and shining at the trains while they yacked at us--and the trains themselves have three blinding headlights that the drivers face all night long). 

Despite their ridiculous complaint, we apologized and started packing up our cameras and tripods, but one worker wasn't satisfied. He gave me three or four lectures about how dangerous we were making life for the Trax people. Right, like they're going to swerve the trains off the tracks because of a little flash. I continued to put my camera away and didn't respond to his rants. Then he said, "We have you blocked in, and the transit authorities are on their way." 

It's true that their trucks had us blocked in. It wasn't true that transit police were coming, because we hadn't done anything illegal. These bozos also had no authority to be holding us against our will. Can you see a lawsuit against UTA? I could. And so could the second worker. He convinced the first worker that they should leave about that time. So they did. 

The workers also didn't realize the danger they put themselves in while trying to be big-shot authorities. Because that part of South Salt Lake at night is not the safest part of town, I had a 9mm semiauto handgun in my jacket pocket. When the workers first approached us, they walked down the passenger side of my SUV to talk to Randy. They never even saw me as I was walking up the driver's side to talk to them. I ended up behind them, which startled the ranter. They were lucky we were just a couple of guys taking pictures. 

I sent a complaint to UTA that night. 

*I calculated later that my camera's max output was about 102 lumens at the trains' distance, and the two trucks were putting out about 6,208 lumens.

An indoor soccer game next to the Trax station at 13th South. 

A building-side mural next to the Trax station on 13th South. 

Incoming train (no flash used here).