Brno, CZ

This is Hlavni Nadrazi, the main train station for Brno. In the past, I've only had one photo of Brno on Flickr, taken of Spilberk, which is the castle, but I took quite a few photos of the place and so I've been sitting on these for awhile. In addition to mainline rail service, Brno also has an extensive tram system, as you can see.

The tram fleet in Brno is far more diverse than the DPP (Prague) fleet, at least if one is counting the active fleet. Prague has Tatra T3s in many variants, Tatra T6A5s, Tatra KT8D5s, a dormant fleet of Tatra RT6N1s which I still sometimes see, and the new Skoda 14T fleet. Brno, however, has Skoda Anitras, Tatra K2s, Tatra K3s, Tatra KT8D5s, Tatra RT6N1s, Tatra T1s, Tatra T2s, Tatra T3s, Tatra T6A5s, and has some unpowered VV60LF coaches and even some heritage equipment. All in all, it's very fun tracking them all down, and in this I thoroughly failed. Here #1081, a Tatra RT6N1, works a service at Hlavni Nadrazi.

Here's #1081 pulling out of Hlavni Nadrazi in Brno.

#1084 looks at first glance to be a Tatra T3....until you notice the articulation in the middle! It's a K2, or articulated T3. In spite of their age, these are still used, along with some much older Tatra T2s, and T1s, which are long gone from Prague. If I'm not mistaken, Prague never had K2s, as they're designed for negotiating very sharp city corners, which DPP hasn't had many of since the 1960s.

Spilberk is not only the castle for Brno (Moravia, CZ), but is also the name of the mountain on which the castle is built. The castle dominates the Brno skyline, is believed to have been built in the 13th Century, with military use continuing on and off until 1959, with many upgrades done in order to adapt to new artillery in the 18th and 19th Centuries, and further modifications (for better tourist access) performed as recently as 2000. It is now strictly a tourist attraction, unlike Prazky Hrad in Prague, which houses a number of government offices, including the President's quarters, and an active army garrison. In addition to being worth seeing for its own sake, the castle also hosts art exhibitions, as in the case, also, of Krumlovsky Zamek, and Prazky Hrad.

Husova is a long street that you can look down from one of the parks, and at the end you can see the so-called "Red Church." Better yet for railfans, you can watch the trams running up and down. :-)

#1615 looks like a Tatra RT6N1, but in reality it's the very last variant of the T3, the T3R, which got a modern streamlined front end. Prague never got these, and instead opted for the RT6N1, which wasn't successful, and had to be replaced by the Skoda 14T.

The gardens, or park, also give you a sweeping view over towards Hlavni Nadrazi, and you can even pick out individual trams doing their runs in the city centre. I couldn't resist zooming in on a K2 and taking a shot, although I wasn't able to get the number.

The Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul, often shortened to Petrov for the hill on which it is located, is one of Brno's main attractions. The site predates the current cathedral, which replaced an old Romanesque one in the 13th Century, but even earlier than that Petrov was the site of the original castle, as Spilberk, the current castle, isn't actually all that old.

Here's more of an angled shot without the ugly modern buildings around Hlavni Nadrazi.

I shot this one down a side street towards the cathedral. One problem that I found the whole time I was in Brno was getting a good angle on it. It's positioned so that photography is actually quite challenging.

This square is called the "Cabbage Market," and it still is a somewhat active marketplace even today. I took this, though, mainly to get another shot of the cathedral.

Formerly the tower of the Stare Radnice (1341-1935), this tower is now primarily a tourist attraction.

Here's another shot of Husova (these shots aren't exactly in order), and the Red Church. The Red Church is actually Komensky Cathedral of the Czech Brothers, and was built in 1863-1867.

Prior to 1998, Tatra was the main make of Czech luxury car, and the company is quite old, still producing trucks and trams today. This T87 was made in 1936, if I'm not mistakan and was classified as a "sport limousine," whatever that means. It was capable of speeds in excess of 160Km/h, but it was rear heavy, and as such, dangerous. Nevertheless, the Germans loved it, and when the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia, the Czechs called it their "secret weapon," because it killed so many Nazi officers! This didn't dampen Ferdinand Porsche's enthusiasm for it, though, and it heavily influenced the design of the Volkswagen Beetle, and hence the Porsche 356 and 911, being a rear-engined, streamlined, high-performance car. Okay, so with the beetle the high-peformance thing is a stretch, but it is notable that the performance of a T87 is higher than an original 1949 Porsche 356!

Here's a rear view of the T87, illustrating yet another safety flaw to the rear-engine design: no rear windshield! In actuality, though, the driver could look back through the engine compartment and see out of the louvers.

I made my Brno trip at the end of 2005, so Christmas was approaching fast, only days away, in fact, so there was the inevitable Christmas market in the town square of Brno.

Here's a rather odd class of electric locomotive, the Class 230. Built by Skoda from 1966-1967 for Ceskoslovenske Drahy, these streamlined, very retro-looking locomotives are still in service on Ceske Drahy today, although some were exported to Bulgaria in the late 1960's and early 1970's. They're rated at 3,080Kw, or 4,130 horsepower, which would still have been very impressive at the time, and they have a maximum service speed of 110Km/h (68 m.p.h.), meaning that they're already obsolete for express passenger services. This one is marked, however, for the CD Cargo business unit, so it's probably well-utilised.