Here are some pictures from my visit to the Railway Museum in Bucharest (Bucuresti), the capital of Romania. You will find this museum at the main railway station, Gara de Nord. The real size train you see on the pictures is the Royal Train, I was told.
In Norwegian (på norsk): Bucuresti: Modelltog og kongelige tog
Here are some pictures from the main station in the capital of Romania, Gara de Nord in Bucharest (Bucuresti):
The last pictures are from the metro station at Gara de Nord.
München Hauptbahnhof (Munich Main Station) has got to be the worst main railway station i Germany. It is not only ugly but also very crowded and chaotic. And there seems to be no plans to upgrade this station.
This was the first impression of the main station in Munich, as I came up from the local underground platforms. Yes, there are works, but these only applies to the underground platforms. The rest of the station will remain ugly.
This is the main departure hall. The station is a terminus, meaning that all trains has to reverse out of the station, and since Munich is a big city this means that the station needs a lot of platforms, they are numberede up to 36( not all tracks exist), but some of the platforms are a 10 minute walk from this hall.
There are lots of trains departing from Munich main station. This board only shows regional and intercity trains. The local trains in the underground departs every fem minutes. There are lots of trains to all main cities in Germany and some to Austria, Switzerland and Italy. ‘
The inside is ugly with pieces of the wall falling off in the main hall. The front of the building is not much better. This station building was built, probably cheaply, right after world war two, and there has been ideas for a better station ever since. But I have not found any concrete plans to build a decent station in Munich for the next ten years. Munich is otherwise a rather elegant city, so weird that they can`t build themselves a decent station.
The chaos is complete when you look at this building. This is a side building, which used to be a station of it`s own, Starnberger. The platforms are now a part of the main station. There is also the same situation on the other side of the main hall. The real strange thing is inside this building.
Almost no people and the ticket booths on the side is not in use. A very different scene fromt the main hall next door where you have to fight your way through the crowds. Exceptionally bad use of space, and all this makes the station very ineffiecent, unusual for germans. All pictures taken in 2014. There are plans for a new local underground line under the city, but this will not effect the main railway station itself.
I was on a trip to Ireland a few months ago and of course I had to do a few train trips. One of them was from Waterford to Dublin:
The experience didn`t start well , because I was trying to book a ticket on the Irish Railway`s website, but I had to give up. I found a ticket for 15 euros, but everytime I tried to actually book I got caught in some kind of loop. So I had to buy the ticket at the station for double price! Annoying!
The train itself was quite alright and comfortable, one of the modern trains that I have seen a lot in Ireland. Waterford station is close to the city centre, just on the other side of the river, so you have nice views as the train leaves the station.
And just outside the station some of the old intercity train carriages is parked. I can remember riding on those, but that must be at least ten years ago. I wonder what they use those for now?
That said, this view from the train is mostly farmland and a few towns and roads. Maybe not the most scenic of railway trips, but a nice way to travel, better than the bus!
At least there is a trolley service on board, serving coffee and snacks. And As you can see this service was quite busy, and filled up closer to Dublin.
At Kilkenny station the train has to do a reversal, but there is a bypass and a few trains use that and saves 10 minutes travel time. Most trains, however, do the time consuming reversal because Kilkenny is the most important stop on the line, except for Dublin and Waterford of course. In the old days the trains went straight through Kilkenny, but many lines have been cut in Ireland.
There is a connection about every two hours and the train ride itself is about two hours. The speed is quite slow, and the entire line is single track and unelectrified. Of course when we reach the join the main line from Cork a few km outside Dublin it goes faster. Strangely the only station on the line that has gates is Dublin Heuston, and there was an additional ticket inspection at the station, That was annoying, so the trip started and ended with some annoyance….
Görlitz is a small but interesting city in the east of Germany. Actually is the easternmost city in whole of Germany and has a fascinating history. The railway station reflects that this once was an important city.
This was once a major Silesian city and it was also an important Lusatian city. These days it is a city of around 60 000 people but the importance of the city is reflected in Berlin, where a main station once was called Görlitzer Bahnhof. This station is now gone, but there is still a subway station at the same location.
To walk inside Görlitz station is to walk inside a living museum. This is the main hall and look at all the details on the walls and in the ceiling!
There are no trains to Berlin anymore, but there are hourly departures to Cottbus, where a connecting train will take you to the capital. There are also hourly departures to Zittau on the border with Poland and Czech Republic. And Dresden is well served with one bihourly regional express and one bihourly local train. There are also three daily departures to Wroclaw, Poland. The border with Poland is only a few hunded metes away from the station.
The station is located in the city centre, and the main street begins as soon as you walk out of the main entrance. It`s a 10 minute walk to the beautiful old town of Görlitz.
The station has a special Bio-shop/cafè, which only sells biological products, in addition to a bakery, a huge kiosk with newspapers and magazines, in addition to a travel centre.
There are no electrical lines reaching Görlitz, but the line between Dresden and the polish border might be electrified in the future. And since there are no intercity trains the station is only served by small local trains, which might get crowded during rush hour.
The area just outside the main entrance does not look fine, as there are no less than three hotel buildings that are closed and are more or less ruins. This is however typical of the old eastern Germany citites, so nothing to worry about.
Berlin, the capital of Germany, has a new(ish) main railway station, Hauptbahnhof. Here are some pictures.
The station is less than ten years old, and is an impressive structure. It is located on the old viaduct “Stadtbahn” on the site of the former Lehrter bahnhof, which in the old days were the main station for trains going to Hanover and Hamburg. It is almost on the path of the infamous Berlin Wall, so the area was deserted during the cold war.
The Cold War also meant that there was no main train station in Berlin when the wall came down. The Zoologischer Garten acted as the main station in west, The Ostbahnhof was named Hauptbahnhof in the east, but Friedrichstrasse and Lichtenberg were also very busy stations in the 70`s and 80`s.
So, after the fall of the wall it was decided to build a brand new main station, and a new tunnel from north to south. East-west the trains still use the old viaduct which takes all trians high above the city centre on four tracks. This means that Hauptbahnhof has two levels of tracks, one underground, 8 tracks and one above ground, six tracks.
In addition to numerous services, the station doubles as a shopping centre, like many modern railway stations in Germany. There are all kinds of shops on many levels and of course lots of cafèes and restaurants.
There are lots of escalators and stairs, and here you see the underground plattforms. Trains to Leipzig and Munich and lots of others have to use the underground tracks, there is no nearby connection between the upper and lower level of tracks.
The station is close to the german parliament “Reichstag”, but not that close to the centres of Berlin, Alexanderplatz. Potsdamer Platz and Kurfürstendamm. There are of course trains going in all directions. The station was in the middle of nowhere when it opened, but it is now becoming a city centre in itself.
A view of the upper plattforms and the special glass roof. This trains go to Warsaw, Poland. There are also trains to Russian and Russian Railways have huge boards marketing this in the station. As of september 2014 the service to Siberia is canceled.
Berlin Hauptbahnhof is an impressive modern station and it is becoming very busy, so expect crowds on busy days. Soon the station will be connected to the subway system, U5 to Alexanderplatz and there are plans of a new S-bahn-tunnel north and south.
First impressions can deceive, of which Zilina railway station is a good example. From the outside during the day it looks old, ugly and like a real “get-me-out-of-here-asap” kind of station. But what a surprise I found inside!
At first glance the station looks depressing, build in a kind of soviet realism style. This is the main entrance, but then again it is not, because most people use the underpass which goes directly from the city centre to the tracks. If you already have a ticket you won`t even see the station building!
A Grey and sad building with some questionable characters hanging around. There seems to be no reason to stay in this station for more than a minute. But wait!
This is the departure hall/ticket hall. Quite functional but look at the details! Especially the windows to your left, which is the city side.
There are several windows with impressing artwork. At night the light from the station make these paintings look incredible from the outside, a huge contrast from the drab building.
I saw it while passing by, but I didn`t have my camera with me in the evening. But, you can imagine how this will look like in the evening.
Another detail from the walls of Zilina railway station. I have tried, but I haven’t found any information to what these are supposed to represent, who and why they were put there. The current station building is from 1946, says the german wikipedia.
You can feel the communist touch and it seems that the building hasn`t changed much since those days, except for the underpass, which I believe is much newer.
And on the track side we are back to grey and depressing. Zilina is almost halfway between the capital Bratislava and Slovakias second city Kosice, both around 3 hours away. The tickets are cheap at just over 10 euros in both directions. There are also direct trains to Ostrava and Prague(CZ). Zilina itself has some nice squares, but it`s not very interesting.
Swedens third largest city Malmö has a new city railway tunnel and the old station building is transformed into a modern travel hub, with lots of cafès and restaurants.
This is the old entrance hall in the old building. Now transformed into a quiet zone with tables and chairs for cafès. Look at the piano to the left. If I remember correctly the last time I was here, the ticket sales was to the far left, and this was the waiting area. (It must be ten years ago, so I might be wrong!)
The building has been extended several times, so it is a patchwork of different styles. The location is just two blocks from the city`s main square and next to a nice looking canal or river.
The first picture in this blog was taken from the stairs in this picture. As you see, there is now a larce Starbucks coffee in the building. There are many more coffee shops, cafès and restaurants in the station now.
This part of the station is now a kind of market, there are several different outlets, among them s a seafood stand. I am pretty this was the departure hall the last time I was here, with the platforms just to the right of the picture.
You don`t have have to walk far to get to the actual departure hall, which is now next door. You see the new hall above, it doesn`t have the same atmosphere, but it does have more shops.
Because of the new tunnel, which brings the trains to and from Copenhagen via the Oresund bridge, the trains departs from two different levels. The old terminal station is used for swedish trains, mostly the long distance trains to Stockholm and Gothenburg. There is one exeception, the train to Berlin also leaves from the Ground floor. That is the train these people are waiting for.
This is a picture from the underground platforms, which was surprisingly quiet at this time. The platforms are very long, it is possible for two trains to stand at the same platform at the same time. The train to the right is a SJ X2000, I am not sure where it is heading. The view is towards Copenhagen.
Theis is the new entrance to the new part of the building, which is to the back of the station, related to the city centre. The long distance buses also leaves from here, just behing the glas structure.
Lithuania has the same problem as the other baltic states. The once great railway system has not been upgraded since soviet times and the trains are now slow and unpopular. However, things are about to change in Lithuania
There are only a handful of train routes in Lithuania. The only longdistance trains goes from Vilnius til Klaipeda. The busiest route is from Vilnius til Kaunas, which was I tested in june.
Vilnius is the capital and largest city while Kaunas is the second biggest city. There are trains between the two cities almost every hour, but during the day there are som gaps in the timetable.
There are some express services taking 1 hour and 10 minutes and some stopping services taking 1 hour 40 minutes. I did not see any clear pattern in when the different services depart, but as a tourist it`s not that important.
The trains are the same, nice newish doubledeckers trains from the Czech republic. They look very much like the local trains in prague do. In some cars the air condition didn`t work, but overall the trains are comfortable.
The route is not especially scenic, mostly the trains go through farmland and there are many old wooden houses along the tracks.
On the way to Kaunas, the train stopped for half an hour, probably because of tracks works. That meant that the express service was just as slow as the stopping service, so do not trust the timetables.
The price is low, 18 litas one way 22 the other way for some reason. Thats around 4 euros. You should buy tickets on the station, all staff I encountered understood english. But, it seems to be possible to buy tickets of the conductor.
And finally a map of Lithuania. Happy train travel!
Kaunas is Lithuanias second city with around 300 000 inhabitants, and the city has an impressive, but quiet railway station. This is set to change in the future!
For now, almost all departures from Kaunas goes to the capital Vilnius, and these trains are rarely full. So, the relatively few passengers have an impressing old station all to themselves. The station looks like it has been newly renovated, but they have kept many of the old features, I get a sense of communist pride in this station.
The station is located on the outskirts of the city centre. The bus station is not far away, but the new town is 20 minutes by foot and the old town even further away, around 3,5 km. The large shopping centre Akropolis is just 10 minutes away. The area around the station has not changed a lot since the fall of communism, and as soon as you step out of the station you feel like you are in USSR in the 60`s. Most of the city centre is actually quite nice, however, and worth a visit!
Back at the station, this is the waiting area between the station building and the tracks. In the middle of the picture there is a cafè serving cheap drinks and snacks. Except vending machines, this is the only kiosk in the station. There are a few benches behind the trees if you want to drink your coffee outside.
The cafè is also nice on the inside, although rather quiet when I was there. Hopefully there are more guests at other times.
The 13.40 to Vilnius is ready to depart. These are newish double decker trains from the Czech Republic. There are almost hourly departures to Vilnius, some are expresses and some stop at many local stations. The price was 18 litas one way 22 litas the other way. I am not sure why there are two prices, maybe the express is more expensive? 18 litas is around 4 euros, and the trip is 1 hour and 10 to 30 minutes.
There are not that many trains to other destinations, although the internal russian trains to Kaliningrad passes through without stopping. In the future Kaunas will become a much busier station. If I understood correctly the works have started on a new line to Poland, which in the end will connect Kaunas with Warsaw and Berlin ( and beyond ) and with Riga and Tallinn ( and maybe even Helsinki in Finland ) The first phase of this Eu-sponsored project will mean that everyone has to change in Kaunas for trains to Vilnius. I don`t know when it will be finished, but the old local trains from Kaunas to Sestokai has been suspended because of the works, so maybe in a year or two?
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