page_title: San Joaquins
section_title: California Car bi-level trainsets
hierarchical_section_title: San Joaquins / Rolling stock / California Car bi-level trainsets
caption_attribution_description: English: The Fresno (Amtrak station) in Fresno, California, USA.
context_page_description: The San Joaquins is a passenger train service operated by Amtrak in California's San Joaquin Valley. Seven daily round trips run between its southern terminus at Bakersfield and Stockton, where the route splits to Oakland or Sacramento.
  The San Joaquins service is unique in the state and nation because of its extensive network of dedicated Amtrak Thruway Motorcoach bus routes that are critical to the performance of the service. Over 55% of passengers on the service use an Amtrak Thruway Motorcoach during part of their trip. Amtrak Thruway Motorcoaches are timed to meet trains and offer connections to points in Southern California, the city of San Francisco, the Central Coast, the North Coast, the High Desert, Redding, Reno, and the Yosemite Valley.
  The San Joaquins is Amtrak's seventh-busiest service in the nation and the railroad's third-busiest in the state of California. During fiscal year 2019, the service carried 1,071,190 passengers, a 0.7% decrease from the prior year.
  Like all regional trains in California, the San Joaquins service is operated by a joint powers authority.
context_section_description: The San Joaquins service is equipped with Amtrak California's fleet of California Car bi-level, high-capacity passenger cars owned by the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans). Each trainset typically consists of two coach cars, a coach/baggage car, a café (food-service) car, and a cab/coach car. The cab/coach car is a similar to other coaches but with an engineer's operating cab and headlights on one end, allowing the train to be operated in push-pull mode, which eliminates the need to turn the train at each end-point. Caltrans is in the process of refitting the cab/coach cars to have a space on car's lower level for storage for checked luggage and bikes.
  Caltrans also owns several Surfliner bi-level cars that are used on some San Joaquins trainsets. The newer cars look very similar to the California Car fleet but feature reclining seats, open overhead luggage racks, and a restroom on the upper level of each car.
  In 2007 Caltrans paid to repair several wreck-damaged Superliner I coaches in exchange for a six-year lease of the Amtrak owned cars that are normally used on long-distance trains. Four of these cars are painted to match the California car livery and often appear in service on the San Joaquins route in place of a coach/baggage car.
caption: A bi-level "California Car" trainset on the San Joaquins at Fresno station
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