Russia is a massive country, which combined with a religious population has resulted in an odd sight – Вагон-храм – railway carriages converted into mobile chapels.
Construction of the first chapel carriage in the Russian Empire commenced in 1895:
The head of the educational department of the Ministry of Railways of the Russian Empire, Yevgeny Volkov, in a report to the head of the Ministry of Railways, Prince Mikhail Khilkov, wrote that a mobile church carriage would best suited to serve railway employees working in sparsely populated areas. According to him, moving from place to place and stopping at the places where railway employees lived, such a church could gather both railway employees and inhabitants from nearby villages on holidays and fasting days. As a result, it was decided to transfer such experience to the Siberian Railway.
Built to commemorate the birth of Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna, construction commenced at the Putilov factory on 14 November 1895, the day of her christening. The carriage was completed eight months later, and was consecrated on 11 July 1896 in New Peterhof, in the presence of Grand Duchesses Olga Alexandrovna and Olga Nikolaevna.
Chapel in honor of the icon of the Mother of God “Hodegetria”
Donated to the Russian Orthodox Church by workers from the Voitovich Moscow Carriage Repair Plant, the chapel consisted of two carriages – the first being the chapel; the second a refectory, a church library and two office compartments. The chapel was consecrated on 18 October 2000 at the Kievsky railway station in Moscow.
Part of a special missionary train operated by the charity group «За духовное возрождение России» (“Spiritual Revival of Russia”) along the West Siberian Railway, the chapel was consecrated on 10 August 2001 by Archbishop Tikhon of Novosibirsk and Berdsk.
Operated by the Irkutsk diocese over the Eastern Siberian Railway, the chapel was consecrated in the name of St. Innocent of Irkutsk on 4 August 2005, to mark the 200th anniversary of finding the relics of this saint.
A second ‘Chapel of St. Olga’ carriage was consecrated on 2 October 2009 at the Krasnoyarsk railway station as part of the medical train “Saint Luke the Blessed Surgeon”. The carriage remained in service until December 2018, when it was retired to Kansk-Yeniseisky station of the Trans-Siberian Railway, where it is now a stationary church.
For heads of state around the world private aircraft are a common model transport. But for Russian president Vladimir Putin, he also has a private armoured train, and a network of private railway stations.
Putin’s armoured train was assembled in 2014-2015, but his usage of the train took off from August 2021, shortly before Russian troops commenced their ‘special operation’ into Ukraine.
Novo-Ogaryovo
Novo-Ogaryovo is the country home of the President of Russia, located 30 km west of the city of Moscow. Completed in the 1950s as the “state dacha”, it was officially recognised as a presidential residence in 2000, with Putin using it as a permanent workplace from 2012. In 2014 a private railway station was located 400 metres away from the residence, at the end of a short branch line from Usovo station.
Bocharov Ruchey (Бочаров Ручей) is the summer residence of the President of Russia, located in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, completed in 1955. In 2017 a private railway station opened on a short siding off the main line.
Dolgiye Borody is a residence of the President of the Russia, located about 400 km north-west of Moscow. Construction started for Stalin in 1934, with the complex being expanded in the 1980s. A private railway siding was extended to the complex in 2019, ending at a railway station with helipad.
Правительственный вокзал (Government Station) is a private railway platform located just north of Kalanchyovskaya station in Moscow. The station was built in 1974 for the use of trains transporting the leaders of the USSR.
I’ve written about a number of railway stations located deep beneath mountain ranges before, and here is another one – Porta Alpina, which was to be located in the middle of the Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland.
Porta Alpina station would have served the Alpine village of Sedrun in Switzerland.
The location selected was the site of a ventilation shaft, located near a crossover between the northbound and southbound tunnels.
A platform would have been located on each track.
And access to the surface would be via a 800 metre deep lift shaft, connected to a 1 km long access tunnel.
The station was proposed as both a potential tourist attraction, and as a transport link to areas around Sedrun, with the Swiss parliament approved CHF 7.5M of startup funding in 2005.
However, further studies raised concerns about the feasibility of the elevators, the negative impact on rail capacity through the tunnel, and the cost of operating the station. The project was put on hold as uneconomical in 2007, and then indefinitely shelved in 2012.
And what got built
Never the less, the emergency platform, crossover and exhaust shaft at Sedrun was completed as part of the Gotthard Base Tunnel.
After 17 years of construction, the Gotthard Base Tunnel was opened in 2016. An opportunity for our group to take a close look at the construction of the century. The SBB offered special trips with the special train “Gottardino” through the tunnel, stopping at the Sedrun emergency stop and an exhibition in the side tunnel.
On Sunday, November 20th, the three of us set out on a journey across Switzerland. Decorated with a white locomotive with the inscription “Gottardo 2016” we were welcomed as “pioneers”. The special trips are very popular, the train was fully booked even though it was a booster train that was used at short notice.
At 2:20 p.m. we left Flüelen in the direction of the Gotthard base tunnel. On the way there was information about the tunnel and the operating concept. The express trains are accelerated to 200 km/h on the route near Rynächt. At Altdorf, freight trains are stopped before entering the tunnel and collected while passenger trains pass. Up to three freight trains then enter the tunnel behind a passenger train. The tunnel is approved for a speed of up to 249 km/h, passenger trains are to run at 200 km/h and freight trains at up to 160 km/h.
After just a few minutes we reached the Sedrun emergency stop at km 21, where the train stopped and we got off shortly afterwards and were able to look around the tunnel system for 45 minutes. An exhibition was prepared, there was a video presentation of the construction and opening of the tunnel, a lot of information and a stamp in the “pioneer pass” that the SBB had issued to the passengers.
The temperature in the mountain was around 32 °C. Due to the natural draft, the air was pleasantly dry. An employee told us that during construction the temperatures were higher and, due to the reduced ventilation and water leakage, the humidity was very high, so that the climate was uncomfortably humid and warm. If the natural ventilation provided by the chimney effect and the piston effect of the flues is not sufficient, fresh air can be blown in through the access tunnels in Sedrun and Faido. Exhaust air ducts were installed in the tunnel ceiling above the driving tubes in the area of the emergency stops, another tunnel system with a diameter of several meters. In an emergency, smoke can be extracted from the driving tube via this exhaust air tunnel.
In the event of an accident in the tunnel, both tunnel tubes will be closed. An evacuation train is provided in the “healthy tube” into which passengers can change through cross passages between the tubes. In addition, trains can stop at the Sedrun and Faido emergency stops and evacuate their passengers in side tunnels. There is an escape route through the side tunnels to the multifunction stations in Sedrun and Faido. The walking distances from the end of the side tunnel or the emergency stops to the multifunction stations are almost 2 km. An evacuation through the access tunnels to the multifunction stations is not planned.
After the tour through the side tunnels of the Sedrun emergency stop, we continued in the Gottardino. After about ten minutes we reached the second emergency stop, at the Faido multifunction station. As under Sedrun, there is also a high-speed switch and a connecting tunnel between the two driving tubes, so that it is possible to change tracks in the tunnel.
The Belgium city of Charleroi is home to the Charleroi Metro – a curious light rail system, with 33-kilometres of track circling the city centre in an underground tunnel, and forming three above ground branches to the surrounding suburbs, along with a fourth branch line that has never opened. It is on this line that this bizarre looking crossover exists – so what is the story behind it?
Like many cities, Charleroi once had an extensive tramway network, with trams that ran on the right hand side of the road with other traffic. It was made up of lines run by the STIC through the city itself, and others by the SNCV which extended into the surrounding rural countryside.
Then in the 1960s the city planned to build a 52 km long pre-metro network to replace the legacy tram system, with eight branch lines radiating from a central downtown loop, and 69 stations.
The first section opened on 21 June 1976, with subsequent stages opened throughout the 1980s. Each time a new section was completed, the existing tram network would be modified to use the new pre-metro, then return to the street for the remainder of the route.
A fleet of bi-directional articulated light rail vehicles was then acquired to operate the new network, supplied by La Brugeoise et Nivelles (BN) between 1980 to 1982.
The western half of the network was to be managed by SNCV who wished to keep right hand running so the new new lines could be integrated with their existing street running system, while STIC running the eastern half wanted to run on the left, so that their fleet of legacy unidirectional trams would be able to use the island platforms at underground stations.
This meant the branch lines in the east to Gilly and Centenaire had to be provided with crossovers before joining the central loop, to get the left hand running trams back to the right hand side, and vice versa.
While the crossover on line M4 to Soleilmont is located in the tunnel west of Samaritaine station.
Footnote: why not swap sides?
The legacy unidirectional trams have since been decommissioned, so why haven’t the new left hand running lines controverted to match the system of the system? The reason – signalling.
The light metro sections of the system was equipped with signalling that matches the existing running direction of trams, so switching sides would require the resginalling of the affected sections of line.
I stumbled across this interesting scene via Facebook recently – what looks like a retired railway carriage being used as a bridge. So what is the story behind it?
Thankfully the person who shared the post initially included the location – Győr, Hungary – and people in the comments mentioned that the bridge is found on the campus of Széchenyi István University.
Over on their website, they had a photo of the bridge soon after it was installed in 1975 at what was then the ‘Transportation and Telecommunication Faculty of Technical Sciences’.
I’ve written about a lot of oddball turntables over the years, and here is another unusual example – a trolleybus turntable in the Germany city of Solingen.
Located at the terminus of trolleybus line 683 at Unterburg in the Burg an der Wupper district of Solingen, the turntable takes 45 seconds to turn a trolleybus.
Until 1959, the independent municipality of Burg an der Wupper was connected to the neighbouring cities of Solingen and Remscheid by tram lines 3 and 4. A separate bridge over the Wupper connected the two tram lines. This was destroyed in the Second World War and not rebuilt. Instead, a stub-end terminal was placed on the Solingen side. The tram was shut down in 1959 and replaced by a trolleybus line.
The narrow valley of the Wupper did not leave enough space for a turning loop, with the tram terminus located on a confined site between the river and a steep slope. Therefore a flat disc-type turntable with with a diameter of 7.5 metres (25 ft) was installed for the new trolleybus line, the mechanism being manually operated by the driver using a hand crank.
In 1968 new 12 metres (39 ft)-long three-axle trolleybuses were acquired for use in Solingen, but these did not fit on the turntable. As a result older vehicles continued to be used on the route until December 1974, when the turntable was extended in length. In 1985, the turntable was completely renovated, and extended to the current 12 metres (39 ft) in diameter.
Why it is no longer used.
Because of the limited size of the turntable, line 683 was the only trolley line in the Solingen network on which articulated trolleybuses could not be used. Enlargement of the turntable would only have been possible with great technical and financial expenditure.
The end came in November 2009, when line 683 was extended to a new bus station at the Seilbahn Burg ropeway terminal. This service was made possible through the use of new articulated trolleybuses fitted with a diesel-engine auxiliary drive, allowing them to operate beyond the end of the trolleybus wires.
The former “Burgbrücke” stop, which was located in the short cul-de-sac between Solingerstraße and the turntable, was moved to the other side of the Wupper river.
And the future for the disused turntable.
The Unterburg turntable is to be permanently preserved for special journeys of the Trolleybus Museum. It also benefits from the fact that it was only renovated in the middle of 2004 and thus has a lifespan of ten to fifteen years. However Stadtwerke Solingen has yet to make a final decision on the future of the trolleybus turntable.
Other trolleybus turntables
Three other trolleybus turntables once existed elsewhere in the world:
Christchurch, Great Britain: in service 1936 to 1969
Huddersfield, Great Britain: in service 1939 to 1940
Guadalajara, Mexico: in service 1982 to 1983, and 1985 to 1988
Plus the oddball turntables I’ve written about previously.
I’ve seen a lot of railway turntables over the years, but this one at Vitznau station in Switzerland is next level – two tracks crossing at right angles, one straight and one curved, both with toothed rack rails, and wired for electric traction. Nothing normal here!
Located on the shores of Lake Lucerne in the Swiss canton of Lucerne, Vitznau station is the terminus of the Vitznau–Rigi line of the Rigi Bahnen, and has two tracks with an island platform.
And in 2022 the railway was again refreshed, when the first of six new Stadler Bhe 4/6 EMUs entered service. These new trains are made up of two carriages connected by a Jakobs bogie.
But the extra length presented one problem – they wouldn’t fit onto the existing turntable at Vitznau! The solution – a third track was added to the turntable.
Running at a 45° angle and on a different angle to the two existing tracks, the new track allows the longer Bhe 4/6 trains to run directly into a depot road that was previously only accessible via a shunt move on the turntable.
The railway is the Uetlibergbahn in the Swiss city of Zürich, running from the central station to the summit of the Uetliberg. The standard gauge railway was opened in 1875 and electrified in 1923, the line has a maximum gradient of 7.9% and is the steepest standard gauge adhesion railway in Europe.
The route has many level crossings, including one at Friesenbergstrasse.
Which since 1952 has also been crossed by trolleybuses on route 32.
The Uetlibergbahn was electrified using overhead lines at 1200 V DC, which is higher than the 600 V DC used on the trolleybus system. These two voltages can coexist using a neutral zone at the crossing, or by switching the voltage supplied to an isolated section of overhead.
But the Uetliberg line also shares tracks with the Sihltalbahn, which is electrified at the mainline standard of 15 kV 16.7 Hz AC. Since 2013 dual system Be 510 EMUs built by Stadler Rail have run between the two lines, using dual pantographs – side mounted for 1200 V DC, and centre for 15 kV AC.
However this was seen as an interim step, with a 2015 study recommending that the Uetliberg line should be converted to the same 15 kV AC standard, with a phased conversion by 2023. Major works were required between April and July 2022.
350 new mast foundations, approximately 1150 cubic meters of concrete, approximately 2000 linear meters of micropiles, 385 tons of steel and 37.5 kilometers of wire – these impressive masses of material are required for the conversion of the power supply of the S10.
So far, the trains have operated with direct current – in 2022 the long-planned conversion from direct to alternating current will take place. The project requires well-organized logistics. Because the measures should be implemented by late summer 2022.
“Viewed from the outside, the duration of the construction work seems very long. There are “only” a few new concrete foundations and catenary masts to be laid, as well as a few meters of power lines. However, if you consider the enormous amounts of materials, the duration of the work is put into perspective,” says project manager Florian Heizmann.
But the sticking point was the Friesenberg level crossing – 15 kV AC and 600 V DC are not compatible, so a complicated switching arrangement was designed.
Marco Graf, spokesman for SZU AG, told ZüriToday: “In August 2019, we submitted the project for converting the power supply on line S10 to the Federal Office of Transport (BAV) for examination and approval. The edition was published in autumn 2019 and everyone was able to view all the documents from the city of Zurich and raise an objection within the specified period.”
The steel construction at the Friesenberg crossing had been largely determined at the time of the approval phase and the geometry and materials were part of the building application, according to Graf.
But local residents were not happy with the massive steel structure.
“We were completely surprised by the construction and are appalled. Nobody knew that the construct would be so big. We don’t think it’s necessary,” says Désiréé Sterchi, a resident next to the Friesenberg stop.
Sterchi and some of the residents think they knew about the project too late – they were negatively surprised in particular by the size of the scaffolding.
“We didn’t know that the construct would take on this scale,” says the woman from Zurich. And why is it so big? “The scaffolding is so large because it has to meet high structural requirements and is already geared towards the planned double-track expansion around summer 2024,” says Graf.
And suggesting that battery electric buses could be used instead.
The bus can run on batteries, as it is doing now during the conversion phase, says Sterchi.
But that was not seen as a solution.
Marco Graf, spokesman for SZU AG, explains that battery-powered buses are not an option because they would break the timetable. “The drive currently is not a permanent solution because it takes too much time.”
Thanks to the new crossing system, the buses of the VBZ and line 10 of the SZU should be able to cross more easily. It is planned that the buses will not have to fold in their pantographs to pass the level crossing, as has been the case up to now. Instead, a crossing system is installed on the steel construction, which enables a seamless transition and yet prevents the bus and train overhead lines from colliding.
The Friesenberg crossing system is used to separate the contact lines from trains and buses with different voltages. The routing of the catenary in the crossing area is still insufficiently calibrated and the pantograph of the trains sometimes loses contact with the catenary for a short time at higher speeds. This meant that individual sub-functions had to be temporarily switched off. While the technical defects are being corrected, the trains at the crossing have to lower the pantographs and slow down.
The SZU spokesman promises optimisations by the end of this week: “According to the information from our supplier, the crossing should then be fully functional.”
The final DC trains ran on the Uetlibergbahn in July 2022, with AC operation in place since August 22.
I’ve been looking at the “left-hand to right-hand running railways” theme for some months now, and I’m still finding more examples – this time it’s the tramway network of Zürich, Switzerland.
The 2.5 km long tunnel with three stations was built in the 1970s for a U-Bahn system that was abandoned in 1973, leaving an empty concrete shell. It was later decided to turn over the unused tunnel to trams, which first used the route in 1986. Each station was equipped with a island platform 138 meters long and 6 meters wide.
However there was one problem – Zürich uses unidirectional trams, with doors only on the right side of the vehicle, so trams had to run on the left track to utilise the platforms – the opposite to normal.
So two crossovers were required where the tunnel tied into the rest of the VBZ tram network – the crossover at Schwamendingerplatz is a conventional at-grade diamond crossing once the tracks leave the tunnel.
But a more complicated arrangement exists at the Milchbuck portal – the two tracks cross over using a underground flying junction leading to two single track ramps.
I’ve looked at many examples around Europe at trams tracks that switch from left-hand to right-hand running, and I’ve found yet another – on the Nockebybanan light rail line in the Swedish capital of Stockholm.
The Nockebybanan is a 5.6 kilometre long line between Nockeby and Alvik in in the western suburbs of Stockholm, connecting with the Stockholm metro and Tvärbanan tram at Alvik metro station.
The first part of the current line to Alléparken was opened in 1914, following the construction of a pontoon bridge across Tranebergssund. The line was then gradually extended westwards, reaching the current terminus at Nockeby in 1929. To the east, the line ran to Tegelbacken in central Stockholm.
Planning for a Metro system commenced in the 1930s, with conversion of the tram route completed in 1952, forming the western section of the present-day Green Line of the Stockholm Metro. As a result the Nockebybanan was cut off from running into the city and became a feeder route for the Metro at Alvik.
Nockebybanan and Lidingöbanan were the only tram lines in the Stockholm region not to be withdrawn in conjunction with the switch to right-hand traffic in 1967. Since the line does not run on the street, and was simple and self-contained, and bi-directional rolling stock was available from the pre-metro tram lines, it was easier to convert to right-hand running than the rest of the network.
The make the connection between tram and metro at Alvik convenient, a cross platform transfer was provided.
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