page_title: Hueneme, Malibu and Port Los Angeles Railway
section_title: Railroad Construction
hierarchical_section_title: Hueneme, Malibu and Port Los Angeles Railway / Railroad Construction
caption_attribution_description: English: Southern Pacific Railroad lines in the vicinity of Los Angeles, CA, in 1944 showing the location of Clement Junction, the original 1879 terminus of the San Francisco and Sacramento to Los Angeles SPRR routes. Composite digital illustration by uploader from self created and PD elements. Licensing SP (Upper) Map &amp; Illustration as a whole USGS (Lower) Map
context_page_description: The Hueneme, Malibu & Port Los Angeles Railway was a standard-gauge, 15-mile railroad in Malibu, California. It was founded by Frederick Hastings Rindge and operated on his 13,000-acre ranch along the coast, which encompassed most of what is today Malibu. He struggled for years to keep trespassers off of his land, and feared that the Southern Pacific Company would use the power of eminent domain to build a railroad through his property. This threat animated Rindge to plan his own railroad to thwart the efforts of the Southern Pacific. This was part of his overall effort to keep outsiders off of his ranch and spoil what he considered to be paradise.
context_section_description: Another threat was the tempting sea-level route that the Rindge ranch offered for the construction of a railroad from Los Angeles northward to San Francisco.  A water-level route would have saved the Southern Pacific from having to use helper engines to shove its trains up the stiff grades of its inland routes through Saugus and the Santa Susana Pass.
  Prior to 1920, the Interstate Commerce Commission did not have jurisdiction over railroad construction, but Rindge calculated that if he built his own railroad through his ranch on the narrow, level strip of land between the sea and the mountains, the courts would not grant eminent domain to a competing railroad wanting to build a parallel line.  Thus, he incorporated the Hueneme, Malibu & Port Los Angeles Railway in 1903, with he and his wife being the major stockholders.
  Frederick Rindge died in August 1905.  It is said that his widow, May K. Rindge, had promised him on his deathbed to preserve the beauty of their “Sunset-Land” ranch and resist all efforts by others to invade their domain.  She spent the next 30 years doing everything she could to fulfill this promise.  It fell to her to build the railroad that they had planned.  She became the president of their railroad, and expended every effort to keep the Southern Pacific out of their ranch.  She was the first woman ever to head a railroad in California, and the only one in the country at large.
  Surveys were run to connect the railroad with the Southern Pacific line at its Long Wharf at Port Los Angeles, which was at the location of the current Will Rogers State Beach lifeguard headquarters at 15100 W Pacific Coast Highway, Pacific Palisades, California.  Surveys were also run to connect with the Bakersfield & Ventura Railway near Hueneme, California.  However, this would have meant extending the line several miles outside the boundaries of the Rindge ranch on either end.  This entailed negotiating with other landowners, some of whom were less than enthusiastic about the project.  To further complicate matters, the Southern Pacific already had a right to the portion of the right-of-way that crossed the Marquez Ranch, which was between Temescal and Topanga Canyons.
  
  Rather than wait for this to be resolved, construction was begun on Rindge ranch property in September 1905.  Renewed activity took place in the spring of 1906.  Crossties and rails arrived at San Pedro docks, and were transloaded to barges, which tugs towed to the new 600-foot pier that had been constructed at Keller's Shelter on the Rindge ranch.  By October, five miles of track had been laid westward from Carbon Canyon (near the eastern boundary of the ranch), and work was suspended for the season.
  The law at the time required that five miles of railroad be constructed each year or the company would have to forfeit the right to continue building.  In 1907, Mrs. Rindge let a contract for another five miles of railroad to be built.  This track, approaching Point Dume, was completed by October.  In 1908, the railroad acquired its only rolling stock, a small, 15-horsepower, gasoline-powered engine made by H. P. Fellows, and two flat cars.  This equipment speeded track construction and assisted in building the railroad's two large trestles, one that was 40–50 feet high spanning Ramirez Creek and the other spanning Walnut Creek on Point Dume.  By October 1908, the railroad was 15 miles long and reached a point 1,400 feet past Encinal Canyon, about four miles from the county line.
  Apparently, no further track was laid thereafter.  The nearest connection with another railroad was seven miles away.  As the Ventura Free Press put it, “It starts nowhere, and ends nowhere.  It connects with nothing.”
  However, the Rindge railroad had achieved its objective.  The Southern Pacific never entered the Rindge ranch.
caption: To this day, the Southern Pacific coast route (now Union Pacific) from San Francisco to Los Angeles swings inland at Oxnard, rather than going through the Rindge ranch at Malibu.
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