On the right (above) you can see the almost brand-new design of AC electric shunting engine which has now largely replaced the elderly types seen in the next image:
Switzerland still has that commitment to staggeringly good graphic design and liveries which we have long since lost in the UK:
Everything is sleek and clean-looking and modern and crisp and efficient and...
An image that is wholly justified by their operating successes (something that many European countries, not just Britain, no longer have: traditionally excellent Germany, for example, was also a shambles in this year's heavy snow. But not the Swiss):
There is much I find faintly repugnant about Swiss society (and no, I'm not throwing stones in a glasshouse here. Just don't get me started on the rotten stench at the heart of British society). But I adore their approach to railways.
2 comments:
The elderly shunting engine is from a batch of 34 delivered between 1944 and 1947.
And the push/pull train seen on the last picture is made of 1st generation's unified coaches (built 1958-1967) sporting the "parrot livery" with flashy yellow doors (not visible), two 2nd generation's unified coaches (built 1965-1975) and still wearing an older livery, and a cab car (built 1976) in the "hummingbird" livery. The locomotive, class Re 4/4 II or Re 420 (n° 11111) was built in 1967.
I realize that it is a trick of photography, but it seems impossible for any train to pass over the rails in the first photograph.
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