Talk about the UK rail network.
Did you know Via Rail has a fleet of British Rail Gauge train cars?
They obtained them from a failed sleeper service through the Chunnel in the 90s. I rode with them on the Montréal to Halifax rail service called The Ocean. Part of a big rail journey I took this summer across eastern Canada and Europe.
I did not know this or about the Chunnel sleeper, very interesting!
Yeah, but British long-term thinking rears it's head again: there was apparently no way to run the train that had just gone under the sea through the other side of London. Even now, the HS1 line that links London to the continent is separated from the new HS2 line that leads up to the Midlands, Northern England, Wales and Scotland by a gap of a about 500 meters which is apparently insurmountable.
In Manchester, there was a huge building constructed as a maintenance depot for the Eurostar and Nightstar trains that even had "Eurostar habite ici" printed on the side in massive text. Seeing that brand new building slowly fade and rot, unused, over the years has been super inspiring, I can tell you.
It sounds like it would have been successful had we gotten our shit together. Although Paris to Glasgow would've been grim in the 90s.
In Manchester, there was a huge building constructed as a maintenance depot for the Eurostar and Nightstar trains that even had "Eurostar habite ici" printed on the side
Oh really, where abouts?
As per that there Wikipedia it was in Longsight though in fairness it does sound like it was put to some use eventually.
it would have been successful if we had gotten our shit together
Agreed. I wonder if people in the 2060s will be saying the same about the castrated version of HS2 we're fucking up today?
I wonder if people in the 2060s will be saying the same about the castrated version of HS2
There will be a Chinese or Japanese version of Race Across the World where a team boards HS2 at old oak common thinking it'll take them all the way to Inverness. How dissapointed they are when the service terminates a few miles up the road at Brum.
I seem to remember reading that there is a heritage railroad society in Canada who runs Swedish passenger cars.
Sweden has a broader loading gauge than mainland Europe (the sleeper services to the continent had to use secondhand German carriages as the domestic ones wouldn’t fit), which would presumably not feel quite as cramped on North American railroads. Britain, however, has an unusually narrow loading gauge. I would imagine that the ex-Eurostar wagons would be considered uncomfortably cramped by Canadian standards.
I remember going on the sleeper train from Berlin to Malmö back in 2011.
It took the ferry between Sassnitz and Trelleborg.
I seem to recall it being normal Swedish SJ sleeper cars, though I do admit that I don't know this for certain
Edit: I think it was either a BC2 or BC4
SJ has had rolling stock in continental gauges for such services. The Stockholm-Berlin sleeper train ran on SJ-branded ex-Deutsche Bahn wagons (which are now RDC-branded, now that the Swedish subsidy has ended).
Chunnel?
It's like the chewb but it goes to France
Euphemism for the Channel Tunnel from England to France under the English Channel. The Eurostar train service.
Everybody! Quick! Get out of the Chunnel!