Virtual Railfan Tour of Switzerland - Thursday - Les Ponts de Martel
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Today we continue exploring the railways of the Jura centered on La Chaux de Fonds. The Transports Publics Neuchatelois (transN) operates a number of railways in the Neuchatel region. These are mainly standard gauge electric but there are two narrow gauge lines, one of which runs from La Chaux de Fonds to Les Ponts de Martel.
Les Ponts de Martel railcar in the platform at La Chaux de Fonds. This is one of three which were built in 1991 and 1996
This video gives a cab ride over the entire line. As we leave we can see three other trains leaving with us. That on the left is the narrow gauge CF du Jura to Glovelier, on the right are two standard gauge trains which will eventually reach Neuchatel on different routes. We cannot see the train to Le Locle which will be leaving in the opposite direction.
The train is well used - this one by a school party on a field trip to a picnic area Once out of town the ride is through a wide green valley with farmsteads. In some cases we can see cows grazing quietly in people's backyards - they are meant to be there!
At Les Ponts de Martel there is frequently a second railcar in the stub end.
It is lunch time and we find a restaurant with a lunch special
We are the only ones not in work clothes - it must be good and economical
The lunch special was very good indeed
Les Ponts de Martel is an interesting place to walk around
We could take the Post Bus back to Neuchatel or on to Le Locle to ride the line to Les Brenets but the train back to La Chaux de Fonds is always fun - maybe we will pick up the school party fresh from their picnic.
Zurich Hauptbahnhof Paul has prepared some extensive notes and photos of the Zurich Hauptbahnhof. This will be in several parts. The busiest station in Switzerland is Zurich Hauptbahnhof (Zurich HB) which is used primarily by the SBB. It has 26 tracks serving almost 3000 trains daily and it is one of the busiest stations in the world. It was built in the 1870s and is a main shopping destination as well as a transport hub. There are three levels for platforms and the "Shopville" shopping plaza. The river Sihl river passes right through the station with platforms passing above and below the river. This shows the general layout of the station with the surrounding tram tracks shown in purple Tracks 3 to 18 are terminal tracks located at ground level, served by two side platforms and seven island platforms. These are used by long-distance trains from throughout Switzerland, and by international trains. Tracks 21 and 22 are underground terminal tracks, served by a sing...
This video, by Noel Wyler, shows what we have just missed. Last Saturday (14 September) the Oensingen Balsthal Railway organized an event to commemorate 60 years of the Re 4/4 locomotives. They brought together 24 of them and ran them as one train. Paul and I flew home on KLM from Schiphol Airport. We took a train from Den Haag directly to the airport. The trip back was marred by a couple with a young boy who was obviously teething. He cried almost continuously for the full six hours. I found I could tune him out when I dug deep into the KLM sound system and found a treasure trove of classical music. Bach violin concertos, Mozart piano concerto No. 23, Beethoven symphonies, Schuman etc. We survived the stupidities at the entrance of the Montreal airport and caught the KLM bus back to Ottawa where we arrived precisely on time. A good ending to a wonderful, tremendous, trip
A Dutch speciality - pancake with cheese, mushrooms and bacon. This was the only picture I took today - after we had finally arrived at Den Haag. We went early to the station at Basel to check on our train to Dusseldorf only to find out it had been cancelled. A visit to the SBB ticket office revealed that the train hadn't actually been cancelled but was starting today from Karlsruhe. They found a connecting train leaving a little earlier which we took. This became progressively later and later so that it arrived at Karlsruhe just as the connection was about to pull out. A frantic dash across the platform and we were able to claim our seats. The journey to Dusseldorf was peculiar, There were periods when the train went fast (up to almost 200 kmph) and other periods when it dawdled. It progressively lost time except that it arrived at its final destination, Dusseldorf, eleven minutes early. (An injudicious use of recovery time in the schedule?) Dusseldorf gave us an opportuni...
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