East Meets West At what can arguably be named one of the most significant sites in American history, the Central Pacific from the west and the Union Pacific from the east met at Promontory Summit to link the Atlantic to the Pacific by rail. Today, the Pacific Railway is but a memory, and the line through Promontory torn up during WWII... But a short reconstructed section at the site where east met west, with two replica locomotives, provides a glimpse of what took place here 149 years ago.