Portal:Trains/Did you know/December 2014

December 2014

 * ...that the enterprising Manx Electric Railway company once owned the entire Derby Castle terminus site, at the northern end of Douglas, Isle of Man, including the row of houses at Strathallan Crescent and the horse tram sheds and offices above?


 * ...that Great Western Railway (GWR) steam locomotive number 111 The Great Bear was the first 4-6-2 (Pacific) locomotive used on a railway in Great Britain, and it was the only one of that type ever built by the GWR?


 * ...that Cottesloe railway station, on Transperth's Fremantle Line, was originally established in 1884 as a request stop called Bullens Siding to serve the Albion Hotel, which at the time was owned by Robert Napoleon Bullen?


 * ...that because the Cape Government Railways ' 4th Class 4-6-0TT locomotives of 1882 were designed to be used both with tenders and without as tank locomotives, the engine-to-tender couplings were the standard bell couplers that were in use at the time rather than drawbars?


 * ...that although the interchange at Canning Town station serving Docklands Light Railway, London Underground's Jubilee line and London Buses is above ground, interplatform access is by an underground concourse stretching the width of the site and connected to all platforms and the bus station by escalators, stairs and lifts?


 * ...that Bowden railway station, the first station on the suburban railway lines from Adelaide to Outer Harbor and Grange, South Australia, retains its original 1856 brick and stone station building on the northbound platform, although it is now unattended?


 * ...that Deutsche Bundesbahn's (DB) Class 10 4-6-2 steam locomotives, built by Krupp and delivered to the DB in 1957, were nicknamed 'Black Swans' ('schwarze Schwäne') due to their elegant shape?


 * ...that Beersheba Turkish Railway Station was opened in 1915 during the Ottoman rule in Palestine as part of the Turkish WWI objective to either capture or disable the Suez Canal and thus put the British Empire at a great disadvantage?


 * ...that the Arnoux system of train articulation invented by Jean-Claude-Républicain Arnoux and patented in France in 1838, was developed to reduce the yaw angle of railroad car wheels thus decreasing wear to the track and instability in the track ballast?


 * ...that after taking control of most intercity passenger trains in the United States on May 1, 1971, Amtrak's first fatal accident occurred on June 10, 1971, when the City of New Orleans derailed near Salem, Illinois?


 * ...that Tunbridge Wells West railway station in Kent, England, part of which is now used by the heritage Spa Valley Railway, was built as part of a race between the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway and South Eastern Railway conducted during the 1860s for access to the town?


 * ...that Warrington Bank Quay railway station in Cheshire, England, received media coverage in February 2009 after a sign was erected prohibiting kissing from its drop-off point, but the signs were removed three weeks later and sold to raise money for Comic Relief with Virgin Trains spokesman Ken Gibbs admitting that the idea was just a bit of fun?


 * ...that the Long Island Rail Road's Mets – Willets Point station, which is now used for sports events and emergencies, was known as United Nations Station from 1946 to 1952 when Flushing Meadows-Corona Park was the temporary site of the U.N. General Assembly?


 * ...that the Strategic Transport Plan, published by the Portuguese Government in October 2011, showed that the Tâmega line required the highest level of subsidy (at €2.50 per passenger per kilometre) of any railway in Portugal?


 * ...that with a front-end design intended to evoke the appearance of the 300 series trains first used on the Marunouchi Line, the 10000 series was the first new electric multiple unit model to be built for Tokyo Metro following privatization?


 * ...that the Kirkcudbright Railway, in South West Scotland, was promoted as a way to connect the area to the national railway network as well as a way to maintain County Town status for Kirkcudbright?


 * ...that before the gauge Swakopmund–Windhoek line in present-day Namibia was built in 1897, the journey from Swakopmund to Windhoek took ten days, but the railway shortened the duration to two days?


 * ...that the Super Tokkyū concept developed in Japan involves building new narrow-gauge lines along the routes of planned Shinkansen built to high-speed Shinkansen standards, including its wider loading gauge, 4000 m radius curves, and total grade separation, thus allowing conversion of the lines to  later?


 * ...that when five unmodified South Australian Railways W class 2-6-0 steam locomotives were transferred to Commonwealth Railways, the condition of these locomotives was such that two locomotives were stripped down and the parts from both were used to make a new locomotive?


 * ...that most of South African Railways ' Class 33-000 GE U20C diesel locomotives built in the mid-1960s survived in main line and branch line service well into the twenty-first century?


 * ...that in the 1890s Chemins de Fer de l'Ouest (CF de l'Ouest) in France built three experimental steam-electric locomotives, which have collectively come to be known as the Heilmann locomotives, that can be considered the ancestors of modern diesel-electric locomotives?


 * ...that Silver Mountain Station in the Thunder Bay District of Ontario, Canada, was home to manager and postmistress Dorothea Mitchell, who became known as "the lady lumberjack" when she purchased a sawmill and waded into the lumber business?


 * ...that the island platform at Shimofukawa Station on JR West's Geibi Line in Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan, is located inside an old canal, with the station building located above the tracks on the north bank?


 * ...that the India Point Railroad Bridge, located entirely within the U.S. State of Rhode Island was, at the time of its construction, the first interstate railroad bridge built in the United States?


 * ...that Schöna railway station on the grounds of Reinhardtsdorf-Schöna municipality, Saxony, Germany, is the closest German station to the national border between Germany and the Czech Republic on the Dresden–Děčín railway, but it is not a border station?