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eastporttunnel

I've gotten a few people asking me what the east side tunnel portal looked like. This is a pretty good photo of it showing the tunnel portal and the substation which was located there. If you go to this spot now (Pinehurst just south of the hairpin turn),


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Joe   [Jan 15, 2007 at 04:46 AM]
what does it look like now?
Tom Motter   [Mar 20, 2008 at 08:07 PM]
I visited this site in October, 2007. It is all but unrecognizable today. In the early-mid 70's the hill and road (then called Canyon Road, now called Pinehurst Rd.) slid down and completely covered over the portal. The road was rebuilt and the very edge of that road, above where the Portal was is now completely slid to the area where the original ROW roadbed was. Were it not for the outcroppings along the orginal "cut" against the south portion of the portal, you wouldn't be able to recognize it. When the weather gets better, I'll submit a photo of the "exact" spot.
Sam   [Mar 20, 2008 at 11:50 PM]
Actually there are a few NOW photos of the area I think further on in this photo gallery. The area is very accessible and somewhat easy to find. If you're coming down Pinehurst from Oakland it'll be a windy road. As you near the bottom, the road will get extremely narrow with a rock cliff on the left, and guardrail on the right. Look carefully at that guardrail and at a point you'll see a white older style guardrail inside of the newer guardrail. You're riding right OVER the top of the portal. Continue on around the hairpin turn until you see a small pullout on your right and a short section of guardrail about 12 feet long. Park there and look for a short little path just above and before the guardrail. You'll see a brown metal post. Continue on and the area will flatten out. You're now standing at the same spot as in this photo! Hard to imagine isn't it?
  [Mar 29, 2008 at 05:24 AM]
When the cave in occurred it just opened up 10 to 15 feet of the tunnel behind the portal and produced only a few cracks in the pavement of Pinehurst Rd above, and many feet behind the portal. The portal was only covered over in the resulting cave in repair job.
Chuck   [Jun 21, 2008 at 03:42 AM]
Go to google maps at this link and select the "Street View" option. Is this the "12 foot guardrail" on the lower stretch of Pinehurst? If you select the upper section of Pinehurst, you can see the "double guardrail". Link: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=moraga,+ca&ie=UTF8&ll=37.840462,-122.182944&spn=0.001396,0.00339&t=h&z=19&layer=c&cbll=37.84004,-122.183013&panoid=VfuzeY3zN4u8_8qyYi9DKA&cbp=1,175.08999999999978,,0,5
Sam   [Jun 21, 2008 at 03:02 PM]
Hey yeah that's it exactly! You can see the small path going up.
Wolf   [Jan 13, 2009 at 03:41 AM]
My buddy and I went down there from the Moraga Side. We saw the right of way while coming down Canyon Rd. The entire right of way is still there throughout canyon, tough to find in some spots but we trekked through there all the way to the tunnel (or where it was) and it was obvious that something was there at some point because of how flat it was and how massive the flat hillside was. Unfortunately we were being mugged by the local residence of Canyon so we decided to jet out of there. It was surreal to finally be there.

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