Johann Marsbar

I've never had the misfortune to attend an airshow with such a shambolic entry system as the one at Travis, as after alighting from the bus, you had to join a very slow moving and long queue to pass through a security check consisting of metal detectors and a manual bag search. It didn't help that the queue, that started off about 4 persons wide, funneled down to just 2 scanners at the end..... After about 90 minutes of roasting in the warm sunshine (whilst the show had already started....) I finally got in to the display area, the airfield security process actually taking 20 minutes longer than it did to get through the US Immigration lines at SFO on the Thursday - and that was bad enough! It was obvious that there was no guarantee of getting my 17.30 train back to Oakland given the bus shambles to get there, so decided to just have a look round everything on static display and get away well before the headline act - The Blue Angels - performed their display. A selection of some of the aircraft there....... (I put some more in the Aircraft Photos thread on here last week) The USAF Heritage flight did a display, which at least included a P51 in a "local" colour scheme to me - one of the Leiston based Mustang squadrons from WW2....... Apart from the aircraft there were some fire service and police displays....... The latter vehicle being one of a number of "rescue" - ie shootout/riot vehicles - that were there. After 90 minutes there, I decided to go and look at the bus situation, getting on board one more or less straight away, which took me back to the station. However, I did notice that only one bus appeared to be operating, and by the time my (earlier) train left at 15.30, some 50 minutes after being dropped off, the bus hadn't reappeared! Neither had the Blue Angels started their display - as you could see what was flying from the station platform, their C130 being the only aircraft seen displaying whilst I was there. A Sacramento bound train passed whilst I was there...... ...but no freights appeared, unfortunately. A double stack intermodal had gone through heading for Oakland when I was in the bus queue when I first got there, but that was the only freight seen moving that day. On the morning journey, I had noticed that MoW work was underway on BART at Richmond, so was able to get some photos of the 2 Plymouth CR-8 switchers in attendance out of the train window.... As I was back in Oakland two hours earlier than planned, I then headed off to sample the delights of Oakland United Beerworks - well worth visiting - before catching BART back to Millbrae from Lake Merritt station..... All the original 1970's rolling stock on BART has now been withdrawn and replaced by the new stock shown above.

Not had the "pleasure" of a trip on any of those small railcars in Poland though have seen a few of them of various types on my travels over there. The only ones I've ridden on are the somewhat larger KM ones (Class SA135) that work services around the Warsaw area......

The next day (a Sunday) consisted of a large circuit Wroclaw-Ostrow Wielkopolski-Lodz-Kutno-Torun-Poznan-Wroclaw, which as well as covering a fair amount of "new track", enabled observation of a couple of tram operations which I'd not seen before. Lodz looked a bit "down at heel" as I walked from Kaliska into the centre and tram operations seemed a bit sparse at that time of a Sunday morning....... I did find this preserved late 1920's Lilpop II tram in use as a Cafe in the City centre - though my Atlas Tramwajow book of 2004 seems to list it as an operational preserved car..... A big surprise was this N class tram/trailer set which appeared on either a special service or charter working...... Heading back to Kaliska station, I did see one of the 803N rebuilt cars used on the Lodz Interurban routes...... ...closely followed by a rebuilt 805Na..... On to Torun and a pair of their 805Na cars near to Torun Miasto station...... Whilst I arrived at the main station in Torun - which is the opposite side of the Vistula to the centre (and no longer served by the tramway), I caught a train at Miasto to travel back to the main station, which turned out to be this SU45 hauled "one coach wonder" - seen at Torun Glowny....... Only other photo of the day was this study of the station building at Moglino, taken from the train......

Another early start the next day saw me head off to Szczecin - out via Poznan and Krzyz and back via Kostrzyn and Glogow. I didn't take any photos until I arrived at Szczecin and was taken a bit by surprise when this rolled in to the station a few minutes after I had arrived there........ Presumably an excursion from Berlin with a complete rake of nicely restored matching DR rolling stock....... I had a couple of hours in Szczecin so was able to wander around taking some tram photos during that time...... There appears to be a secondhand (ex German?) MAN articulated bus in the distance in the last photo, something I should have taken a proper photo of at the time, and the advert on the right hand shelter for the "Tramway to Sweden" - actually a Unity Line ferry service - is of note! At least one of the Polish regions had obtained some secondhand Class 624 units from DB at that time and some were in use on services operating out of Szczecin...... There wasn't a lot of interest on the (rather slow) loco-hauled service that I caught from there back to Wroclaw via the Kostrzyn/Glogow route, other than this CTL Rail (Ex ZSSK) ET05 at what I'm guessing was Rzepin......... ...and this fairly new (2005) railbus at Nowa Sol, working a Zagan service and one of a small class of 7 similar units....

Not been to SLC as yet, but that is one of the remaining options for this year, so I'll see if I get there or not. WES in the Portland, OR, area do it as well, but the platform road is the one set back from the main track there....

The SMART line does cater for freight traffic and the operation has recently taken over the provision of this from a third party and appear to be actively seeking such traffic now. As SMART is a high-platform operation, bypass loops are provided at the stations to avoid freight cars hitting the platforms.... The former station at Santa Rosa is now the local tourist office and contains a small historical rail related display in part of it...... After a visit to a local brewpub for some sustenance (not that they actually appeared to brew their own beers....) I caught SMART south from there to the ferry terminal for San Francisco at Larkspur, the train here arriving at Santa Rosa..... The current (and recently opened) terminus at Larkspur is a good 10-12 min walk from the ferry - via a slightly circuitous route - and the line originally used to continue onwards to Sausalito where the original ferry terminal was located. Just south of Larkspur station is this former trestle and lift bridge which has been preserved..... The (high-speed) ferry is quite a nice ride, giving scenic views of San Quentin State Prison..... ...and the Richmond-San Rafael bridge......... The following day, a Saturday, I undertook what turned out to be quite an endurance test in attending the "Wings over Solano" event at Travis Air Force Base. An early start on BART from Millbrae saw me in Oakland by 08.00 where some action was seen in Jack London Squre.... ...including the southbound "Coast Starlight"..... ...before I caught the 09.15 Sacramento service as far as Fairfield-Vacaville station, where the train is seen in the platform....... The station there only opened in 2017 and, frankly, there is not exactly a lot in the immediate area, being designed as a "parkway" type operation, though apparently a lot of development is planned in the area according to some of the locals. There was supposed to be a 15 minute frequency bus running to the airbase, and I joined a queue that got progressively longer. Word was that it had been cut to a 20 min service - though as there were no notices anywhere, that info was apparently only on the event FB page..... Eventually, after 45 minutes in the hot sun, a bus appeared and most of the queue managed to squeeze on, so we headed off into the very heavy traffic , it taking 25 min to cover the 2 miles or so into the base, where we all got off...... We did pass one other bus working the route at the time, but by the time I left the airshow - rather earlier than I had anticipated due to the shuttle farce, that other vehicle had vanished, leaving just one bus on the route!

Back in Wroclaw that afternoon, I had a wander around the City Centre discovering that quite a significant number of buildings had actually survived the Festung Breslau period in 1945. The main City square had been completely "restored" - though when you compare the 1945 images with those of today, they did "backdate" a lot of the buildings to earlier styles which, in my eyes, gives a rather false appearance. On a later visit (2016) I did buy a very interesting book containing then current images of the City with ones taken in the 1945-48 period and the amount of damage sustained in some areas certainly explains why they just flattened the districts south of the main station and started again - with only a few original buildings surviving. The building in the background of this shot of a Konstal 102Na is a pre-war built department store and local landmark........ The building with the twin towers is the rather substantial prison (built 1850-1930) and the brickwork has been cleaned and the building restored since this 2006 photo was taken.... Next to the prison is the police station, built as Breslau Police Presidium in 1925-28........ The former Breslau Frieburger Bahnhof city terminus is now in use as a theatre and arts centre.......... In 2006, tracks were still down in the station and there were a few random items of rolling stock parked in the area, including this Ty2...... The tracks have since been lifted, and I do wonder if the fate of the Ty2 was to end up as the infamous "Train to Heaven" artwork that now graces the City on Legnicka (seen in 2014)....... Jelcz built buses were still common on the local bus services, with this one parked up in what is now an unimportant side-street amongst post-war blocks of flats, but the remains of the tram tracks in the cobblestones indicate a busier thoroughfare pre-1945....

Not lately - last time I looked at them they were just known as Otter Tail Channel and had about 3 cameras to the north of Minneapolis. Looks like they have expanded a bit since then!

At least with the dire weather here at the moment I've had a chance to sort through the photos now........ This trip actually started off as being planned as one to New Jersey covering the ground that I should have done on the March 2020 trip there that got cancelled by me at the last minute - for obvious reasons - though, as it turned out, I would just have got away with going on that one as lockdown came in on the day I was due to get back to Heathrow! However, looking around at prices, it was apparent that a holiday could be had for a similar duration for much less money if I went to San Francisco, despite it being another 2500+ miles further away, plus the weather was likely to be better in mid-March there than it would have been in NJ. It was for most of the week, and I've spent most of the last week shivering here after temperatures in the 70's F at the start of the holiday. The daily plans for the trip did change whilst I was over there, though I did cover most of what I had intended to during the week. I flew out with Virgin Atlantic LHR-SFO on what actually turned out to be a B787-900 rather than the originally booked Airbus, having decided to avoid BA after my last experiences with them to SFO back in September 2019 and stayed at the same hotel that I did in Millbrae, close to the airport, which I had stayed in on my 2016 trip to the area. With the general (high) prices in the Bay area, this place had the advantage of a very substantial breakfast buffet to set you up for the day, thus avoiding the need to grab breakfast elsewhere. It is located about 20-25 min walk from Millbrae Caltrain/BART station, as well as having a direct bus service (Samtrans) from the street outside into San Francisco, though that took 90 mins, even if it was only just over $2 single fare. On the first morning I walked to the station and bought a $12, Zone 1/2 day ticket on Caltrain (single fare is $5.45, so worth buying), starting off with some early morning moves for photography at locations such as Belmont... ...before ending up in San Francisco for a quick walk around. On Line F, the Kansas City liveried PCC car was out in service..... ...whilst one of the New Flyer articulated trolleybuses was seen on the very frequent Service 14........ I was actually going to spend most of that day out of SF in Marin & Sonoma Counties - to the north of the Golden Gate bridge - an area I hadn't been to previously. I travelled first to Santa Rosa via the Golden Gate Transit bus route 101, which travelled over the bridge after leaving SF....... There are very good Public Transport services in most of the Counties in the Bay area so you can get around very easily without hiring a car. Sonoma and Marin Counties now actually have a passenger rail service again after many years (last operating in the 1950's) on the former North Western Pacific route and I returned to San Francisco via rail and ferry rather than the bus. The new service started in June 2017 using Nippon Sharyo built railcars, as seen here at Santa Rosa..... I believe they are the same type of units as those used on the Toronto Pearson Airport service in Canada. Santa Rosa is served by a number of different bus operators and as well as the long Golden Gate Transit Interurban route that I travelled there on, there are the County bus operations.... ....and City operations......

Another 04.15 start the next day...... This day didn't exactly go to plan as I had intended to cover the Poznan to Wolstzyn steam service, but when I arrived in Poznan I found this sitting in the platform..... On reflection, I should have done the trip for the SM42 haulage, but decided to have a quick look around Poznan (it was planned to be back there later in the week for a much longer period) and return to Wroclaw earlier than planned and do some exploring there. Poznan station has changed out of all recognition now due to a large shopping complex being constructed over most of it, but in 2006 the platforms were all out in the open air and the station produced a few interesting things, such as this EP08...... One of the rebuilt EN57 units...... ...and in the City centre itself, a T34 tank....... The tank was a bit of an unexpected find and was at least in Polish colours, rather than being part of a Soviet WW2 memorial which is where you usually find such things. A WW2 German tank parked on a piece of open ground by a tram stop in Omoluc, CZ, was a somewhat more bizarre find a few months later! Having taken the direct line from Wroclaw to Poznan on the outward journey, I returned via Kluczbork where this Ty45 was plinthed at the station..... ...and this ex PKP SM03 shunter dating from around 1960 (was SM03 022) was present at the Wagrem (wagon?) works....

Another new one - Tyrone, PA - though the split screen arrangement is a bit odd.....

There's an East Greenwich, RI, camera which has appeared in the last few days which covers the NEC just south of Providence......

I broke my journey at Tychy for just over an hour to have a look at the local trolleybus operation - a system that wasn't actually constructed until the 1980's. At that time the fleet was mostly composed of Jelcz built vehicles........ ...though they had recently obtained a couple of Solaris Trollinos........ I didn't take a ride on the system on that day though - that would have to wait another 9 years, by which time all the Jelcz built trolleybuses had been withdrawn. I did find this rather good condition Fiat 127 parked up whilst I was wandering around......... Remarkably rust-free, given their reputation, particularly as I owned one from 1984 to 2020, and as far as I know it's still about somewhere. From Tychy, the lure of the Tramwaje Slaskie system was too strong and I travelled the short distance to Katowice, before heading out to the Myslowice area...... The state of some of the track at that stage made you wonder how long the system would survive - Follow the right hand rail up to the "curve", which looks more like a 30 degree angle at the rail joint....... In central Katowice the tracks were in a much better state though..... From Katowice it was back to Wroclaw, where this EP09 is seen...... I seem to have got back around 18.30 after 14 hours or so of travelling - which was actually quite a short duration compared with some of the other days I was using the rover ticket!

I might well have some more recent ones that feature clearer views of some of those buildings, as I don't think they have changed that much since the 1980's. You can see one of them in a bit more detail - certainly the windows & fire escape arrangement - on this 2005 shot..... Will have a look through my photos and see if there are any others.

July 2006 saw me off to Poland for another weekly Regional Rail ticket - this time based in the City of Wroclaw, somewhere I'd visited briefly some 21 years earlier but had never seen much of the place at that time and certainly wasn't aware of how much of the pre-1945 city had actually survived, the area to the south of the main station where we stayed in 1985 mostly being rebuilt post-war, with the north of the station faring much better. O'Leary Airlines provided the means of getting there.......... Though, apart from a small, modern(ish) terminal building - since replaced by a much more impressive structure in a different location - it hadn't changed much from 1938 when it opened as Flugplatz Breslau-Schöngarten - a Luftwaffe airfield! Nothing obvious could be found about bus services into the City either, and certainly nothing resembling a ticket machine (as is present nowadays) and after finding the bus stop outside, I ended up buying the ticket from the driver for the run downtown, where I quickly located my hotel, a shortish walk from the station. I then headed off to the station to buy the PR weekly ticket, the distinctive main buildings surviving the war....... ...and they have since been restored further, including the two train sheds. There was plenty of time for some tram photography, including some refurbished/rebuilt 105N's...... ...and original condition 102Na's....... Some new track installation was under way in the area as well....... The next day saw the start of the rail ticket and I had drawn up a much more adventurous timetable than that used earlier in the year, even if it meant some rather long days, these photos being taken at Wrocław Główny at 04.15 on the first morning! The route started off that day as Wrocław - Opole - Kedzierzyn Kozle - Rybnik - Pszcyna - Tychy, where this SM31 is seen in the sidings adjacent to the main station there.....

This one, taken circa 1978, shows a bit of detail on the buildings backing on to the lines on the south side of the station.....

Some of the other equipment on display at the Travis AFB show....

I've never seen anything adverised commercially to do a conversion job like that from the EFE model so might have to be a DiY kitbash job. I did something similar with a 2mm scale whitemetal kit of an RE many years ago to produce a 2-door version as used by Ipswich Borough Transport (ex Leicester City). An OO whitemetal kit was certainly available for the 2-door version in the past and may be still available. This one must date back about 50 years and is part of a fleet of Bristol area prototype model vehicles I'm looking after for someone at the moment......

Travis AFB KC-10 farewell event as part of the Wings over Solano Airshow the weekend before last...... Absolute shambles to get into the place having travelled there from Oakland on Amtrak to Fairfield-Vacaville station to catch the advertised free bus every 15 mins to the base. Only thing was, there appeared to be 2 buses in use, which got caught up in all the traffic. A bus appeared after 45 mins wait, with a 15 min run into the base, where you then joined a slow moving queue of people that took 90 mins to go through a security checkpoint ! (whilst the flying displays were in progress) Just ended up having 75 mins at the show before making an early exit for an earlier train. Caught a bus straight away, but that appeared to be the only bus on the service by that stage as It hadn't reappeared at the station by the time my train left 50 mins later........ There were still long lines of slow moving traffic trying to get into the show at the time I left on the bus (14.30) with only the Blue Angels left to display in the show. I could see their C130 perform from the station platform, but I never saw them take off by the time my train left just after 15.30 ! (They were due to display at 15.00)

The rather odd looking USNS John Glenn moored in Oakland last week....... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USNS_John_Glenn Not sure what is happening to that vessel at the moment as it's only 10 years old but was listed for decomissioning last year according to an Internet search.

I did spot this other section of street running track in Oakland from BART (near West Oakland station) last week...... Looking on Google maps, that appears to be Union Street and you can follow the tracks for well over a mile on there, running along 3 different streets, before it peters out under a Freeway. Still appears to be in use at this end, and the SPV Atlas I have lists it as Oakland Terminal RR but I'm wondering if it used to originally Sacramento Northern Interurban trackage in the past. Didn't really have time to explore it on foot and some of that area was "dodgy" to say the least - as was the walk between the BART station at 12th/City Centre and Jack London Square TBH.....

Actually managed to see a manifest freight in Oakland on one of the days I was there last week...... I missed the front end of a southbound Intermodal by about 2 minutes when I arrived, though the rest of it stopped me crossing the road for another 5 minutes!

I was last there in September 2019 and I think 2021 was the planned EMU introduction date being quoted then so I didn't expect to have another chance of riding on the diesel services again. When looking around for a suitable destination for this trip, I didn't actually intend to go to SF again, but the flight/hotel deals were actually coming out a lot better than the other options I was looking at! All the electrification works appear complete and they are certainly testing the new stock, though it's mainly overnight. Didn't see any moving, though a couple had their lights on at San Jose depot last Thursday. This was also in the platform at SJ Diridon that morning.... ...and there seemed to be a varying number in the platforms at King/4th in SF throughout the week, so some were obviously moving about at times. I believe this September is the start date for the electric services, though unfortunately they won't be using these......

Oakland, CA, last Sunday.......

Twilight of the Caltrain F40's........... At least I've now achieved 43 years of North American Photography! This thread will burst into life again once I've gone through the 600+ photos I rook in the Bay area last week..............