The Guardian ran a series of articles looking at the state of high-speed rail travel today. France intends to double its length of track over the next decade, and China is planning a massive rail-building programme, including a high-speed line which will halve the travel time between Beijing and Shanghai to 4 hours. In Germany, domestic air travel is rapidly going extinct, and Spain's network has made day trips between Madrid and Barcelona a possibility. The USA, which has long neglected its rail network, is planning up to 10 high-speed lines. Meanwhile, Britain's only high-speed line goes to France, but there is talk of a 250mph line from London to Birmingham and beyond, possibly by the early 2020s. Meanwhile, the CEO of France's rail operator, SNCF, weighs in on what the UK should do.
posted by acb on Aug 7, 2009 - 49 comments

Beautiful train stations that fell to the wrecking ball.
posted by gman on Jun 23, 2009 - 72 comments

Paintings of trains. I like the energy of this one, but there are enough for everyone to have a favorite. [more inside]
posted by winna on May 9, 2009 - 14 comments

A glance will show / Why Phoebe Snow / Prefers this route / To Buffalo.
And Phoebe's right / No route is quite / As short as Road / of Anthracite.

In 1908 the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad began work on the New Jersey Cut-Off to make its New York to Buffalo mainline (the Road of Anthracite so liked by Phoebe Snow) even shorter and faster. It was to have no grade crossings, and was to be as straight and level as possible — through hilly terrain. The 28-mile Lackawanna Cut-Off, as it is now known, was built over three years, cost $11 million, and was an engineering marvel of massive reinforced concrete bridges, enormous cuts, and the largest railroad embankment in the world. All of this has been abandoned for years, though there are plans afoot to restore the Cut-Off for commuter rail. [more inside]
posted by parudox on Dec 24, 2008 - 17 comments

Seventy years ago today a world land speed record was set that has never been broken... on July 3, 1938 LNER Class A4 4468 Mallard reached the giddy speed of 126mph. [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry on Jul 3, 2008 - 22 comments

Dead Road - Museum of Communism in the Open. "It was one of the most ambitious projects of the Stalin era, known as the 'railway of bones'. At least 10 people a day died during the four years of its construction [actually 1947-1953], but unlike most of Uncle Joe's grand designs it was never completed and now sits unfinished in the tundra, an icy road to nowhere." The transpolar railway was built by labour camps^ 501 and 503 and construction was stopped after the amnesty following Stalin's death in 1953; 800km, about half, was built. Some sections are currently in operation, but much is abandoned: depot and locomotives in Dolgoe, Dolgoe itself, labour camps, more spectacular decay. (Previously: Norilsk, which was supposed to see an extension of the line.)
posted by parudox on Aug 27, 2007 - 13 comments

Hisakyu's Railway Guide
posted by hama7 on Dec 7, 2006 - 21 comments

London to Brighton in Two Minutes (2006) [HI Apple Quicktime, LO Adobe Flash] preceeded by London to Brighton in Three-and-a-Half Minutes (1983) [RealMedia, context] preceeded by London to Brighton in Four Minutes (1953) [RealMedia, context]
posted by riotgrrl69 on Oct 1, 2006 - 21 comments

One small german army and a train. (large pageload of photographs). Also: a flash slideshow of the same army (parent site) [via]
posted by peacay on Aug 22, 2006 - 18 comments

Music history rendered on a London Tube Map They say: "Could we chart the branches and connections of 100 years of music using the London Underground map? Dorian Lynskey explains how a box of coloured crayons and lot of swearing helped." I say: Look also at the comments in the accompanying thread, which features trolling, snarkiness and repetition, beginning with "Why did you do this? What is the point? Wouldn't you have been better off doing something else? Sometimes you media people really worry me." The Guardian are introducing commenter registration on their new blog.
posted by feelinglistless on Feb 12, 2006 - 18 comments

The London Necropolis Railway During the first half of the 19th century, London's population more than doubled and the number of London corpses requiring disposal was growing almost as fast. Cemetery space in the city had failed to keep pace with this growth, and so the vast new Brookwood Cemetery - the London Necropolis - was built in Surrey. Brookwood was the largest burial ground in the world when it was opened in 1854 by the London Necropolis & National Mausoleum Company. To get there, the deceased and their mourners - segregated by class - could catch a train from Westminster. The Necropolis Railway survived until World War 2, when it was heavily damaged. The railway was subsequently closed as motorised hearses became more popular. See also: Also: a six part Fortean Times article extracted from Google's cache [1 2 3 4 5 6]
posted by carter on Aug 1, 2005 - 14 comments

The Brighton Daddy Longlegs Railway ran offshore along the beach at Brighton, UK, at the turn of the 20th century. Designed by Magnus Volk, it ran on 24 feet high stilts, over the sea, and required a trained sea captain to operate it. For a few years, it was quite the tourist attraction. The rest of Volk's Electric Railway is still in operation.
posted by carter on Mar 4, 2005 - 3 comments

Photographs of London Underground Stations Taken on black and white film, then coloured in photoshop. A nice example.
posted by carter on Jan 25, 2005 - 34 comments

A golden buckle on the steel girdle of Russia : Completed in 1905 and considered to be among the major masterpieces of Russian engineering, the Circum-Baikal Railway offers Trans-Siberian Rail passengers breathtaking views of the world's oldest lake and its rugged surroundings. Over only 72 kilometers, the railway's designers had to construct 200 bridges and viaducts and 33 tunnels to navigate the terrain.
posted by sellout on Jan 19, 2005 - 11 comments

Citycat's Railway Web Site.
posted by hama7 on Jun 15, 2004 - 3 comments

Serviceton is a small railway town on the border of South Australia and Victoria, and was once a means for traders to escape taxes when travelling between the colonies, due to errors made when surveying the state borders. No train has stopped here since 1986, and now only a handful of people remain in the town, a sad downfall that Tom Waits has immortalized in song. But abandoned railway stations, closed as populations decline or trade routes change, exist the world over, in the city and in the country, and yes, even in France. They look like great places to explore.
posted by Jimbob on Mar 19, 2003 - 2 comments