7 Replies to “Sunday Open Thread: Testing Wuppertal’s New Train”

  1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1LRgqLv3dQ

    Will personally sit at a beautiful carved-wood table with clawed lion’s feet gathering signatures for this one! And fact that an elephant fell out of one of these trains and didn’t get hurt probably proves that somewhere in their history, these creatures actually knew how to dive.

    Since they are definitely more graceful than a hippopotamus- forget if they’re related- could be a wonderful tourist draw to add a special car for an hourly aquatic event every couple of runs as the train passes the foot of 24th Avenue NW in Ballard. They’e also less inclined to bite people in half than average hippo does.

    However, should be posted warnings alongside the Seat-hogs above the windows warning passengers to keep their Newfoundlands and yellow labs on a tight leash. Those dogs just love to wag tails off their bearings and do what some other huge thing just did involving water. But just to be fair, elephant should get a lot bigger stick to bring back before he “shakes off.”

    Mark

    1. For those who don’t know German, on October 4, 1900, Kaiser Wilhelm rode this “kaiser car” on the Wuppertal Schwebebahn (schweben = hang/soar, bahn = railway). It says you can book a ride online on this historic car but you’ll have to wait a long time. Normally the Schwebebahn runs like a subway every 10-20 minutes or so. When I rode it in 1998 I think I remember much of it running over a river, and steep hills on both sides in parts. The cameras here are focusing on the areas with lots of buildings and not showing the river much. That might overstate how urban the entire route is, and understate the length it covers the river. I was actually a bit surprised that there weren’t more concern about its environmental/recreational impacts on the river, the fact that a train overhead put it in perpetual shadow, and one of the city’s main assets was lost. But of course nobody thought that was in 1900 and now it’s historic and a tourist attraction, so maybe Wuppertalers are satisfied with sacrificing the river this way. But I can’t imagine anyone being able to build a train over a river now, at least not in the US.

  2. Mike, I doubt it’s a major surprise to either of us how the average Wuppertaler viewed the general environment of an industrial city in 1900. Especially the river, whose rail route raised mixed feelings.

    It made possible a fast, clean ride on a train that, unlike everything else in town with a motor, was smoke free. But they probably wished the river itself smelled more like smoke. Anyway, somehow doubt that we’d put the fare in the “Affordable” category.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgfRq4kEFro

    But interesting thing to me, The structure holding up the elevated track looks to be a masterpiece of strength, economy of materials, and ease of assembly. Sort of a miles-long horizontal Eiffel Tower. Would rather live along the Ship Canal with that over it, than anyplace in Seattle, knowing last Monorail effort had passed, and was running anywhere in the city.

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/40133088670/in/dateposted-public/

    Built for the World’s Fair in Paris in 1889. Massive protest from the art community. Famous writer Guy de Maupassant always ate there because it was the only place in the city you couldn’t see the damn thing. Planned to be taken apart in 1900.

    So in 1900, very good chance that a German city was just “rubbing it in” about winning the Franco-Prussian war thirty years before. And that the Wuppertal arts community itself sponsored the monorail with plans for an enormous celebration when they dismantled their own spine of girders.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eiffel_Tower#Artists'_protest

    No mention of any problems with the elevators on either project. Some interesting discussion of the elevators on the tower. Maybe we could find some Indiana Jones descendant to look for plans and prototypes. Or maybe that reporter in The Night Stalker.

    Because it really is a shame we can’t feature a panel discussion between Gustave Eiffel and the KONE elevator company. It’s not like Finland to build anything mechanical that doesn’t work. So maybe Dr. Jones can help unearth a plot by a certain Chief Executive of ours to return a lot of favors to a trusted friend of his. By getting even for what the Finns did to the Russian Army in 1939.

    Just a thought.

    Mark

  3. Seriously, Oran, one of best postings STB ever did. Like the link to the Eiffel Tower, some deservedly-unsettling insights about what, and how long ago, an engineer could calculate with the computer between his ears. And what his city would allow to be built.

    But I’ve got a sneaking sense that I’ve finally killed the Seattle Transit Blog. Honest, it’s not Mike’s fault. So will try to come up with a set of those electric “paddles” to restore it to life. Here goes….

    1. TO SAVE THE SEATTLE’S PASSENGER PUBLIC FROM GOING BANKRUPT $124 AT A TIME, THE MONORAIL SAYS IT’LL SELL ITSELF FOR AN ELEVATED PARKING LOT RATHER THAN USE ORCA!

    2. WILL STOP LIME BIKES LYING AROUND ALL OVER THE PLACE!

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/41897604492/in/dateposted-public/

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/41223384254/in/dateposted-public/

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/41897639762/in/dateposted-public/

    3. STREETCARS AND LIGHT RAIL ARE A RIGHT WING PLOT!

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Electric_Railway_Journal

    https://books.google.com/books?id=4–gBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=THE+NEW+ELECTRIC+RAILWAY+JOURNAL+1993&source=bl&ots=hA4PjYGAzs&sig=eUOZsOZphjPk0tm_Sc8Mcrz5QxA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiqmbeyyPLaAhWEAXwKHQioASQQ6AEIZzAP#v=onepage&q=THE%20NEW%20ELECTRIC%20RAILWAY%20JOURNAL%201993&f=false

    Damn! They got us ALL!

    Fleeing like a rat,

    Mark

  4. “The advantages here claimed for the system are, that sharp curves can be traversed at high speed and with perfect safety, and that an elevated railway on this system offers the minimum of obstruction to light and air.”

    Interesting how contemporary the assessment is, Glenn. And how 118 years have proved that the Germans were right. Nothing about the system has been necessary to redesign in ten decades, from the structure to the running gear.

    Those supports, incidentally, are absolute mastery of material and structure. That steel isn’t an inch longer, shorter, or diameter-size than it has to be. To hold the track in place, and carry the dynamic weight of the trains. And very easily assembled. And from the looks of it, taken apart if need be.

    But most important is how specifically the design of this railway is fitted to its route. A placid river with gently curving banks to hold its supports, and the river itself permanently keeping its own length clear of barriers like buildings or trees.

    The American engineers were right about its misfits with New York conditions. Where the same German engineers would definitely have built pretty much as happened. Our own monorail’s main problem was that its choice owed mostly to preconceived political ideology. Hopefully, valuable lesson cheaply learned.

    Would be good, though, if there are some existing plans and studies that can help with future elevated rail
    between Ballard and West Seattle. A project that doesn’t get build in one decade still has lessons for the next at least five.

    https://io9.gizmodo.com/5903042/in-1950-an-elephant-fell-out-of-a-monorail-in-germany

    Cruel to the poor elephant. Though since these creatures not only carry carefully thought-out memories, and pass them along to their descendants, the little girl’s great great grand-kids might have some invaluable consulting experience for upcoming decades of de-sprawling our suburbs.

    When elevated rail structure simple and easy to build might create some valuable memories of its own.

    Mark

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