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Vienna in Autumn 2011
For more than a decade I've been traveling to Vienna at least 4-5 times a year, but that's history, and I haven't been to the austrian capital for two years now. Lots of things have changed in that time, so I've hopped onto a RailJet one cold autumn weekend day in October with a friend to see what's going on there.
To the left: our RailJet in Budapest's Keleti pályaudvar before departure, just before dawn. To the right: almost as bad lights a few hours later at Kennedybrücke in Vienna, with two type V trains of the U4 metro line. Because of the cloudy, grey weather I ended up taking less photos than I have planned.
Short ULF trams in Reinlgasse, just opposite castle Schönbrunn (you can even see the Gloriette in the background on the photo to the right).
Because of the poor lighting conditions, instead of taking photos, I took videos. This one starts at Grinzing, continues at Schottentor, takes us towards Hohe Warte, and then back to the city, to Schwarzenbergplatz.
To the left: a long ULF in Hernalser Hauptstrasse. To the right: Paschinggasse, part of the reversing loop of route 10 and 44.
From here we took S-Bahn line S45 from Hernals (left) to Döbling, where after a while we got to the corner of Pokornygasse and Döblinger Hauptstrasse (right).
A very short video of the S45 line, including two shunting locomotives that came passing by.
Tram line 38 took us to Grinzing and back.
To the left: track maintenance under rolling wheel at Nußdorfer Straße/Alserbachstraße. To the right: the Praterstern railway station looked a bit different when I last saw it!
Another tram video, starting in Lainz, and after some ULF interior shots continuing with places we saw on photos.
The U2 metro line was extended over the Danube in 2010, so we've had to ride the new stretch, too. To the left we see the bridge on which the line crosses the river, to the right the interior of a classic Vienna metro car.
The new stretch runs entirely on viaducts.
From Stadlau we took a train back to the city, more precisely to Südbahnhof. On the way we alighted at Praterkai/Handelskai, filmed a little and continued our journey with another train. By the way, the ascending "tone ladder" sound of the Taurus locomotives sounds wonderful in the tunnel! :)
Südbahnhof (literally "South Station") used to consist of two stub train stations standing at right angle to each other: the Raaber Bahnhof/Centralbahnhof/Staatsbahnhof/Ostbahnhof and the Gloggnitzer Bahnhof/Süd-Bahnhof. This building complex was closed in 2009 and torn down in 2010, to make room for Vienna's future main railway station. Only a few stub platforms have remained on the eastern side to house minimal local and regional (to Bratislava in Slovakia and Gyõr in Hungary) services. And behind all current activities you can see a huge construction area spreading for miles and miles!
To the left: a Talent EMU of the hungarian state railway MÁV. To the right: the subterranean tracks used by the S-Bahn and some regional services.
A video from the sufface and subterranean train activities.
This is where the station used to be.
To the left: the turnout for an extension of tram line D over the railway, where a new business/bureau area is being built. To the left: a tram 18 heading west for Südtiroler Platz.
If we take that tram 18, we'll soon arrive to the tram subway ("Ustraba") under the southern section of the Gürtel ring-road...
... that even features a triangle junction at Matzleinsdorfer Platz. We ended our trip here before heading to the Westbahnhof to catch our tram back to Budapest.
If only the weather would have been kinder to us...
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