Aaron Bowers was a little kid the last time Manteca had a serious train derailment.

It was during December of 1989.

And it happened on an early Sunday morning during Christmas vacation, before the politically correct term winter break replaced the name given the two-week hiatus from school.

That meant Manteca High as well as nearby Lincoln School weren’t in session.

Industrial Park Drive did not exist.

What the railroad crossed instead was a narrow, seldom-used washboard country lane named Spreckels Road.

The almond orchard lined Spreckels Road T-intersected with both Moffat Boulevard and Woodward Avenue somewhat following the alignment of present-day Van Ryn Avenue.

Firefighters on the first engine that responded said they initially could not see the derailment from Moffat given the extra thick tule fog.

There were several tanker cars with chemicals that derailed.

That prompted a measured precautionary evacuation primarily of the nearby Powers Tract neighborhood nestled between Manteca High and today’s Spreckels Business Park.

There were no injuries.

The Fresno main line was reopened to freight traffic less than 36 hours later.

Today, Bowers serves as the Director of Facilities & Operations for Manteca Unified that serves 25,000 students.

As such, he is responsible for making sure that enhancing campus safety is part of $419 million in bonds voters approved between Measure G and Measure A.

Doing so at the 104-year-old Manteca High campus has been the most challenging.

Up until a few years ago, a city street — Garfield Avenue —  cut the campus in two.

It literally made it possible for unauthorized people to walk on campus when school was in session.

At one point, Manteca Police had to respond to a homeless man with a long sheathed knife wandering onto campus via Garfield.

That problem was solved when the city turned a section of Garfield Avenue over to the city while retaining an easement for buried city water and sewer lines below.

Today, thanks to bond funding, wrought iron fencing now secures much of the campus.

The reorientation of the “front” of the campus to Moffat was done primarily for safety as students come to and from school.

Safety concerns, by the way, also include bordering streets.

It wasn’t too long ago that ago that a parked vehicle along Moffat contributed toward visual issues that led to a serious collision between a Manteca High student and a car.

Moffat traffic is a big concern for the school district.

So are primary routes to school that fall under the Safe Routes to School initiative. The biggest such foot path to house-laden southeast Manteca — some may refer to it as the Woodward Park neighborhoods — goes down Moffat along the train tracks and crosses the railroad just over half a mile away.

Now, let’s talk about the San Joaquin Rail Commission, the folks behind bringing commuter rail service to the region.

That includes ACE service to downtown Manteca.

The train stop —  the boarding platform and parking lot —  is going in across from Moffat.

It makes Manteca High the only high school on top of an ACE line.

Guess what else Manteca has when it comes to ACE.

Sixteen — count them — at-grade train crosses also exist in Manteca. And that includes 10 on the heavily traveled Fresno main line.

The rest are on the Altamont line.

Stockton, where the rail commission is headquartered, has a lot of crossings too, but none where the trains whip by consistently at 55 mph.

Nor does it have a major siding where trains are parked crossing two major streets for as long and as many times a day as Manteca.

Nor does it have a high school on top of a rail line.

The rail commission is clearly aware of the Union Pacific Railroad notifying area jurisdictions back before the pandemic that by 2045 they envisioned upwards of 135 freight trains passing through Manteca daily on the two lines. That was compared to the 56 daily trains running at the time.

That did not include ACE trains.

The rail commission is working on solutions to existing rail traffic congestion issues when it comes to be ability to expand passenger service.

One is a grade separation for Union Pacific, where its tracks cross the Santa Fe line in Stockton.

In doing so, it will eliminate the need for one train to stop when another train is crossing.

The solution will ease the need somewhat to side trains on the Fresno line as it passes through Manteca and Salida somewhat.

Trains will still need to be sided, but for not as long.

That said, operations will get trickier as the freight and passenger train count increases.

It will mean more sidings of trains and not less.

The rail commission has an answer for that as will. It’s called double tracking.

The goal is to eventually double track all the way from Stockton to Merced, where ACE will connect with the California High Speed Rail System.

That will allow high speed riders to continue on ACE trains to the Bay Area as well as Sacramento and even reach Chico by rail.

The double tracking will take while and will be done in phases.

The first phase double tracks the line to a point south of the planned boarding platform across from Manteca High.

That work — along with work at the Lathrop railroad where a transfer station will be built to connect with Bay Area passenger lines — is breaking ground in the next year or so.

Now back to Manteca Unified.

The rail commission hasn’t been in contact with the school district regarding its plans. Perhaps they believe the City of Manteca serves as their de facto agent.

But you’d at least think the rail commission had that covered given the unique situation.

A question that the school district might want to ask is whether that double tracking initially will connect with the siding.

If it does, that means UP will have the ability to sideline freight trains farther north and still do so without blocking the Main Street crossing.

Clearly, the double tracking between Manteca and Lathrop gives more options of where to stop trains, none of which are good while waiting for a train in the opposite direction to pass.

That is, of course, if trains other than ACE run on the second track.

It is an operational option to do it either way.

What the rail commission has in mind and might allow to happen has a safety ramification, as small as it is, with a train being sidelined directly across from the school that could have chemical tankers.

Ignorance is not necessarily bliss when knowledge isn’t shared.

The likelihood of an issue is not probably much higher than a derailment.

And buildings that house students are far enough away that the state regulatory agency that approves school site construction had no issue with it per se in terms of setback.

However, both the double tracking and the train stop for passengers are literally happening at Manteca High’s front door.

The biggest concern by far is how tossing intense spurts of vehicle traffic connected with commuter trains as the years pass and the area grows along with use of the rail does will impact the drop off and pick up traffic at the start and beginning of school.

The commission staff, besides not ever communicating with Manteca Unified, is pushing back on the city’s effort to get the commission to foot the bill for Sherman Avenue and Moffat intersection safety upgrades, given the development of a commuter station that has boarding and disembarking that will eventually add to before and school traffic snarls.

Apparently, footing the bill for $600,000 or so for a traffic signal or less for a roundabout is not a priority in the world of the rail commission.

If the city was dealing with a non-government entity, someone dumping that kind of traffic that poses a serious safety conflict involving school children wouldn’t be able to say no.

 This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com