Sunday, May 25, 2008

Munich Hauptbahnhof

The second week of May, I had the opportunity to attend an IEEE working group meeting in Munich for work. On my second night there, I took the time to ride the subway over to the main train station, known as the Hauptbahnhof.

The main streetside entrance is impressive, if modern.


Walking toward the concourse, DB (Das Bahn) has their version of 'Mr. Soo Line' offering information and greetings to travelers.
The Hauptbahnhof is a stub-end station, with tracks entering from the west. (A smaller station is on the east side of town, and is known as the Ostbahnhof.)
The northernmost tracks receive local and regional trains, including the one shown below.
Germany's version of bilevel commuter coaches was used on this regional train.
A couple of the high-speed InterCity Express (ICE) trains were also present. This one is of the highest-performing model, as shown by its more dramatic aerodynamic profile.





An older style of ICE train was also there, with more of a shovel-nose profile.

Typical of DB's trainsets, the ICE equipment is built by a consortium of German companies, as shown by the decal on the older one.
An interesting collection of equipment was there that evening, as seen in the similarities to that used in North America.


Friday, May 23, 2008

Timing is Everything

Friday, May 16th found us taking a trip to La Crosse to visit friends. Coming into sight of the CP main at Bangor, WI, I noticed a train in the siding. As we got a little farther west, we found the head end, so I took the exit figuring he was waiting for a meet. Unfortunately, as I exited I-90 the eastbound UP train that the CP train was waiting for went through. To make matters worse, the back end was brought up by a Mopac "shack on a raft" caboose.


By the time we got through town, the meet was complete and the westbound began moving.












We arrived in La Crosse around sunset and I made a quick detour to Grand Crossing. A COLX coal train was headed east as we arrived. Once that cleared, a BNSF eastbound departed . . .














. . . with a KCS unit bringing up the rear.













As the BNSF stack train clears the plant, you can see another eastbound CP train approaching (to the right of the white sign)









The CP stack train was lead by a CEFX leased unit and a SOO SD60










Soo 6025 to be exact.

Once this train cleared, another BNSF train headed east. As we left and headed out over the tracks towards HWY 16, I noticed the original westbound CP train we saw was pulling up to the home signal at Grand Crossing.

All told, in the span of about an hour, we saw 6 different trains.




Saturday Morning didn't turn out to be quite as good. We found a freshly painted GP38-2 sitting in the La Crosse yard












The remote controlled switcher had things in hand.













While I was taking pictures of the GP's, a westbound BNSF MOW train pulled up and changed crews. I managed to get back to the west end of the yard before he did and got a couple of shots off.








For the rest of the morning, I saw only one other BNSF train and that was at a distance. Even the CP was quiet.


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