InsideTransit

Yesterday we looked at a pretty neat postcard-to-model subway train. Now we have a paper model you can print and create at home.  The available models include:

• TGV PSE (Paris Sud-Est) original orange version
• TGV PSE (Paris Sud-Est) blue Ligne de Coeur version
• TGV La Poste
• TGV Atlantique
• TGV Thalys
• TGV Duplex
• AVE / Euromed (Spanish TGV)
• KTX (Korean TGV)
• Speedrail (Australian TGV)
• Acela Express (USA)
• Undecorated TGV

It looks like you need just some basic supplies (and some thick paper) to create the various trains. Pretty neat craft project!

Found this last night via Tamar — the “build your own” group has put togther a variety of paper subway car models that you can buy. They arrive on a postcard and you cut them out to make the subway car. I know I want some of them – they even have an El track so you can put the model up high.

Here’s the order form for Chicago and NYC. The cards are $1.50 each.

If you are a railfan, you’ve most certainly heard of BVE. BVE is a train simulator that freaking rocks (I wish it worked on Vista!) which allows you to “drive” train routes from around the world that developers have created.

Now I’ve come across a site which is a different kind of simulator – this time it’s a schedule simulator. You pick a city system from the following: LIRR, SEPTA, Chicago Metra, WMATA and MBTA. Then just sit back and watch the full map for the system and you see dots on the map move as the schedule moves. What’s really amazing is to watch the activity at rush hour.

Maybe, just maybe, riders will have a bit more respect for just the sheer number of trains that pass through the system on a given day. It only takes a minute to watch the whole day so give the simulator a try.

Here we go – try walking from one end of this train to the next – I’ve seen 12 car trains but never a 15 car train. The train in the video below is from Tokyo and consists of 15 cars including 2 double decker cars. The video’s creator estimates the train at 300 meters long. The train has great pickup as well as it leaves the station very quickly.

Now this is something…how many times have you stood at a bus stand in the middle of the summer sweating like crazy in your fancy business suit and then you realize the bus will be late? Check out this photo from Dubai where they have been installing air-conditioned bus stands. I want this everywhere I travel!

I wonder if there are TVs in there or perhaps a snack or beverage machine – that’d be even hotter! Of course here in NYC the transit agency has gone from a huge surplus to a billion-dollar deficit – so I doubt we will see these anytime soon.