San Juan Capistrano Station Train Camera

Trackside at a Historic Santa Fe Depot

The camera is mounted at San Juan Capistrano Station, where the main track runs past a low platform framed by vivid bougainvillea, palms and the brick tower of the 1894 Santa Fe depot. Built in Mission Revival style to echo the nearby mission, the depot ranks among the earliest stations of that style in California and now houses the restaurant Trevor's at the Tracks, which hosts the camera.

Trains You Can Watch

Amtrak's Pacific Surfliner links San Diego with Los Angeles and points north along this line, and Metrolink commuter trains on the Orange County and Inland Empire-Orange County lines stop at the platform. A few BNSF freights pass through as well. The route is Metrolink's Orange Subdivision, a designated Quiet Zone where horns sound only at the engineer's discretion.

A Camera That Moves

This is a PTZ camera: operators pan, tilt and zoom to follow approaching trains, the platform signs and the pedestrian-only crossing beside the station. The framing changes as trains come and go while the location stays the same, giving railfans close-up looks at locomotives and passenger cars.

Historic San Juan Capistrano

The station stands between two of the town's best-known landmarks: Mission San Juan Capistrano, founded in 1776 and famed for its returning swallows, and the Los Rios Historic District, a street of adobe and board-and-batten homes just across the tracks that is regarded as California's oldest continuously inhabited neighborhood.