Portal:Trains/Did you know/October 2010

October 2010

 * ...that the abandoned Woollahra railway station in Sydney, Australia, was originally intended to have been an operational twin-track, central platform heavy railway station on the Eastern Suburbs Railway Line, between Edgecliff and Bondi Junction, and it would have been the only above ground station on this line?


 * ...that when the gauge Wilkau-Haßlau–Carlsfeld Railway opened in 1831 in the western Erzgebirge in Saxony, a line that is now operated as the Museumsbahn Schönheide heritage railway, it was the first, longest and steepest of the narrow gauge railways in Saxony?


 * ...that the West Side Yard, a rail yard owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority on the west side of Manhattan in New York City, was designed to accommodate an overbuild in its air rights, and space was left between the tracks to permit the installation of columns to support a platform above the tracks?


 * ...that despite having a section of line just outside Waterford run over deep bogland covered in bulrushes, construction of the 7.25 mi long Waterford and Tramore Railway, the only line in Ireland that did not connect to any others, was completed in seven months?


 * ...that the Waldenburgerbahn, a 13.1 km long narrow-gauge light rail system in the canton of Basel-Country, is the only railway in Switzerland with a track gauge of ?


 * ...that the W type carriages used in Australia were originally built to fill an operational hole after Victorian Railways converted the central part of their network to electric traction and subsequently converted a large number of 'Swing Door' rollingstock to electric traction?


 * ...that the eastern portion of the former Chicago Aurora and Elgin Railroad Villa Avenue Train Station station in Villa Park, Illinois, served passengers, while the western portion functioned as a Western United Gas and Electric Company office because both the railroad and the utility company were owned by Samuel Insull?


 * ...that the Delhi Metro's Violet Line was originally scheduled to be opened in March 2010, but two construction accidents on consecutive days in July 2009 pushed back the line's opening until October 3, 2010?


 * ...that before the 574.8 km/h record setting run of the V150 on April 3, 2007, in France, a section of track on the LGV Est was prepared by increasing its superelevation, the catenary voltage was increased to 31 kV from the standard 25 kV and mechanical tension in the wire was increased to 40 kN from the standard 25 kN?


 * ...that when the railway line over Usui Pass in Japan was rebuilt in 1963 to eliminate a rack railway portion, the new line still included a 66.7‰ (1 in 15) gradient requiring the use of JNR Class EF63 banking engines?


 * ...that United Streetcar, based in Portland, Oregon, is currently the only American company building modern streetcars, having completed their first order for new streetcars in 2009?


 * ...that in contrast to other low-floor trams, the floor in the interior of an Ultra Low Floor tram is at sidewalk height (about 18 cm above the road surface), which makes access to trams easy for passengers in wheelchairs or with baby carriages?


 * ...that line U7 of the Berlin U-Bahn was originally the south-eastern branch of the Nord-Süd-Bahn (U6) that ran between the branching point at Belle-Alliance-Straße (Mehringdamm) and Grenzallee, but in the 1960s, this stretch was separated from the rest of the line and extended at each end to form a new line?


 * ...that the Turku tram, which originally opened in 1890 using horsecars, closed in 1972 and now being considered as a candidate for a new light rail system, was the first tram system in Finland?


 * ...that to prevent interference with the geomagnetic measurements of the Japan Meteorological Agency at its laboratory in Yasato, Niihari District, Ibaraki, the portion of the Tsukuba Express line from Moriya to Tsukuba operates on alternating current while the rest of the line uses direct current?


 * ...that in addition to a wide variety of railroad equipment, including an Aerotrain and the only surviving Milwaukee Road class EP-2 electric locomotive, the Museum of Transportation, located near St. Louis, Missouri, also features automobiles, two airplanes and a boat?


 * ...that a footpath and footbridge over the River Dart form the only non-rail land access to Totnes Littlehempston railway station in England, although a small jetty allows a water taxi to link the station with the centre of the town at some states of the tide?


 * ...that Transtech Oy, Finland's major domestic manufacturer of railway rolling stock, including the InterCity 2 double-deck carriages now in service with VR (Finnish Railways), specialises in building railway vehicles for extreme climatic conditions?


 * ...that the list of historical tram systems in Australia includes the largest cable car system in the world in Melbourne and the first fully electrified tram system in the Southern Hemisphere, as well as the first commercial use of double-decker trams outside of Europe, in Hobart?


 * ...that Southern Pacific 4460, a GS-6 class steam locomotive, is sometimes nicknamed "The Forgotten Daylight" because unlike SP 4449, it has been on static display at the Museum of Transportation in Missouri for more than 50 years?


 * ...that during construction of its northern England Settle–Carlisle line, a task that involved the employment of over 6,000 navvies who lived in camps in remote locations and harsh conditions, the Midland Railway helped pay for scripture readers to counteract the effect of drunken violence in these isolated communities?


 * ...that the Tünel underground railway, which began operation in 1875 in Istanbul, Turkey, is the second-oldest subterranean urban rail line in the world after the London Underground?


 * ...that the Toyama Light Rail Toyamakō Line, known as "Portram", a portmanteau of "port" (Toyama Port) and "tram", is regarded as the first fully converted or constructed "light rail transit" (LRT) in Japan?


 * ...that as well as being the fastest express of its type in India, the Bhopal Express connecting Bhopal Habibganj and Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station also has the distinction of being the first express train to be ISO 9000 quality certified?


 * ...that Earlestown railway station in the United Kingdom has remained in continuous use since its opening on 15 September 1830 with the Liverpool and Manchester Railway and is regarded as having the oldest railway station building in the world that has survived on an operational passenger station, as well as the world's first stationary turntable?


 * ...that during the 1997-2006 refurbishment of the Dresden Hauptbahnhof (Dresden Central Station) in Saxony, Germany, it was discovered that the steel arches supporting the train sheds had been distorted out of alignment during the bombing of Dresden in World War II?


 * ...that the Western Australian Government Railways P class 4-6-2 "Pacific" type steam locomotives were delivered with wide Belpaire fireboxes to aid with the use of poor-grade local coal from the Collie coalfields, and were 30% more efficient that earlier locomotives of similar tractive effort in operating with this fuel?
 * ...that a track circuit interrupter may be fitted at catch points, trap points or buffer stops to maintain a track circuit in the 'occupied' state, preventing dispatchers from lining a running train into an accident scene, in the event of a derailment?
 * ...that Tower Hill, a former station on the abandoned North Shore Branch of the Staten Island Railway in New York City, is one of the few stations along the North Shore line still standing as of 2010?
 * ...that Tokyo Metro 07 series trains were originally delivered with a two-handle control system, but the four trains transferred to the Tōzai Line were modified with a single-handle (left-hand) system?
 * ...that Tissington Trail, a rail trail in England that uses the former London and North Western Railway line connecting Ashbourne to Buxton, features a restored signal box at Hartington that is now used as an information center?