Rail Photos, Part 2

It was my understanding until recently that most of the Class 730 fleet had been retired, but lately I've seen a lot of them still running. This units was sitting in one of the sidings at Podebrady with some autoracks.

Jaromer is a bit of a tourist town in its own right, if you like the out-of-the-way ones, but this is the first photo that I have ever taken of the station. I was just passing through on my way to Nachod, another relatively unknown town that is home to the Primator brewery.

This is Nadrazi Ceske Skalice, that with its unrestored looks and black and white signs, looks like something from the steam era. The only modern thing in this photo, really, is that white portacabin. I've often wondered since taking this whether Ceska Skalice would be an interesting place to visit.

This is the station at Nachod, which is surprisingly large for the town. In the background on the hill you can see the zamek.

This bay was interesting. It looks like it was meant for a rail vehicle, yet there isn't any rail connection on the street or across the street, nor any room to turn a typical rail vehicle. Can anybody explain this? Also, there doesn't seem to be any provision for unloading, or any room for a rail vehicle of practical size.

This was a lucky shot with my cameraphone while I was waiting for a show behind the Meet Factory, a club closely connected to the alternative sculptor David Cerny. The tram is a Tatra T6A5 built around 1996, although the number is too blurred to read.

This wasn't my first-ever shot of one of the new Skoda 15t trams, but it was my first shot of one in revenue service. This was at the Narodni Divadlo stop, and the only reason that I got the shot was that I was in the coffeehouse in the Nova Scena (formerly Laterna Magika) theatre connected to the Narodni Divadlo, or National Theatre.

This photo isn't of anything special, but is the better of two shots I took from the train in Chomutov on the way to Karlovy Vary, a city I had always wanted to visit as it's one of the main Czech tourist destinations that I've so far missed. I kept this one and uploaded it mostly because I liked the composition. This is also my first shot posted to Flickr (I think) taken with C41 black and white film, or at least the first taken with Kodak BW400CN.

This was another shot that I kept because I ended up liking how it looked. I would have probably preferred a color "file photo" sort of shot here, but I had black and white film in my camera still, and this ended up being good enough to post anyway.

This is another shot that's far from a "file photo" type of shot, that I took because I saw the opportunity to get a "depth-of-field" type of shot through this tree. Karlovy Vary has two primary train stations, Hlavni Nadrazi and Dolni Nadrazi, but it is possible to travel straight through both of them on the same train, winding down the hill from Hlavni Nadrazi to Dolni Nadrazi, seen here, although the center track in the picture is a stub end ending in a bumper just below the camera.

Here's a more conventional shot of Dolni Nadrazi. I'm assuming this is a Communist-era building, but I don't know its precise history.

Here's a more representative view of the platforms and yard at Karlovy Vary Hlavni Nadrazi.

I spotted this unit in one of the stub-end platforms, and noted that it's a Class 242 electric, a class that I liked when I first arrived in the Czech Republic, but rarely got to photograph since it's designed to run on 25,000v 50Hz current, and therefore rarely sees service near Prague. These units actually aren't as old as they look, as although they use a car body style introduced by Skoda in the 1950's, they were actually built in the period 1975-1981. They have 4187 horsepower (3080Kw), and can run at up to 120Km/h (75 m.p.h.), meaning they're not speed demons, but can work local passenger trains and freights.

This is one of the Seimens RegioSprinter DMU's used by Vogtlandbahn for cross -border services between Germany and the Czech Republic, particularly the Northwest of the Czech Republic. I wasn't expecting to see one of these, but given where Karlovy Vary is I shouldn't have been surprised.

#363079-6 worked my return train to Prague, and although this photo is a bit dark I decided to include it anyway. The quality of light varied on the way back, but it actually stayed light quite late.

This snowplow, technically a snowspreader, if I'm not mistaken, was parked in Chomutov waiting for the winter. Normally, these types of plows have much higher blades, but this one may be too light for them. It isn't clear whether this one is steam or diesel powered, as I don't know much about it, but I'm assuming diesel. Note that it has CD, and not CD Cargo or SZDC, livery. This photo has been heavily edited due to the setting sun overexposing the original, the negative being damaged and/or dirty, and graffiti fouling the original scene. The CD livery is, however, real.

Here's a generic, color photo of Nadrazi Chomutov, in contrast to the black and white posted earlier.

This coal train, headed by a Class 127 electric locomotive, is dedicated soley to the MUS mining railway. The 127 Class is exclusive to this line and the SU mining railway in Sokolova, as it runs on 1,500v DC current, and is dedicated solely to heavy freight service, with a maximum speed of only 65Km/h (40 m.p.h.). Power is surprisingly low, at only 2,937 horsepower (2,190Kw). This rail line carries lignite from the surrounding mines, which are among the only coal mines still active in Bohemia. They've been so active historically, in fact, that numerous towns and villages, and even the city centre of Most, have been destroyed by strip mining and subsidence. The world record was set for the largest building relocated on wheels, when the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary was moved from the original Most centre to the new one in 1975. See these links for more details: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_Assumption_of_the_Virgin_Mary_ (Most) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most