On a recent train trip from Wilmington, Delaware to Washington, D.C. I had the pleasure of riding on a Northeast Regional train with Amtrak's new Cities Sprinter electric locomotive designed by Siemens. The Sprinter is energy efficient and offers a smoother and faster ride. A smart infrastructure investment to improve passenger rail service on the Northeast Corridor.
There was a time when Washington's subway system was the envy of the nation. So clean. So efficient. So modern. Well, thirty plus years of deferred and poor maintenance, mismanagement, safety lapses and lack of proper funding has turned Metro into a mess. The subway system of the most powerful city in the world has become an epic embarrassment and even a symbol of the nation's neglect towards its public transportation infrastructure.
Yes, Metro is spending $5 billion on improving the system and making necessary safety repairs following National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recommendations after the horrific 2009 Red Line collision that killed nine people and injured 80 others. But these projects have really inconvenienced riders with long delays due to single tracking and stations being shut down for repairs. Also, it is dispiriting for many riders to still see so many broken down escalators. Or there was the incident October of 2010 when during the Rally to Restore Sanity the L'Enfant Plaza escalator collapsed injuring several people. And even when the escalators are working they run dangerously slow and sometimes produce truly horrific sounds.
The bottom line is sadly Metro is in a depressing state of dysfunction and it will take years, perhaps decades, for the system to be restored to its former glory. But thankfully there are other new and innovative ways to get around town as I discovered yesterday evening.
I was riding the Orange Line from Ballston to Metro Center for dinner and got stuck on a delayed train at the Clarendon Station due to a mechanical failure on a train at the Stadium Armory stop. After fifteen minutes of not moving on a packed rush hour train and no announcement to passengers on when we would start moving again, I decided to exit the train and the station and walk across the street to the new Capital Bikeshare station. The shiny red bikes were a sight for sore eyes. I was so glad bike sharing had expanded to Clarendon. I rented a bike, hopped on the saddle and was breezing along Wilson Boulevard while the Metro train was still stuck at the station. I rode through Rosslyn, across the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge into The District, past the White House and to Gallery Place-Chinatown where I dropped the bike off at a station. I was only around 15 minutes late to dinner thanks to Capital Bikeshare.
So when Metro fails, and trust me it will let you down, know that Capital Bikeshare is always there as a backup. Plus you get exercise and it's just plain fun bicycling around town. The only problem is that the system doesn't provide helmets so unless you just happen to carry around a bike helmet on your Metro ride, be extra careful if you go bike sharing without a helmet!
Riding the rails along the Elbe River in the Free State of Saxony, Germany.
July 19, 2011 -- After visiting Berlin this summer, the next destination on my rail journey around Europe was Prague. I rode the EuroCity 171 Hungaria train from Berlin Central Train Station (Hauptbahnhof) to Prague Main Railway Station (Praha hlavni nadrazi). We traveled through the spectacular Saxony countryside along the Elbe River (Labe in Czech) and Bohemia in the Czech Republic.
The train was an older model and the Czech Republic isn't set up for high-speed rail yet so it didn't go as fast as most trains traveling through Western European nations. Czechoslovakia dissolved into the Czech Republic and Slovakia rather recently on January 1, 1993 following two uprisings against the communist regime -- the Prague Spring of 1968 and the 1989 Velvet Revolution. There are plans to construct a high-speed rail network in the Czech Republic, although operation isn't expected until at least 2020.
Prague Main Railway Station and train I took from Berlin -- EuroCity 171 Hungaria, whose final destination is Budapest, Hungary.
But traveling at slower speeds was actually preferable because it offered more time to enjoy passing the scenic countryside and historic villages, towns and cities in Saxony and Bohemia.
There are four seats to a cabin with a sliding glass door and I had it to myself for most of the trip. There is rolling cart food and beverage service as well.
As en environmental journalist and clean energy blogger, I couldn't stop snapping pictures of the wind turbines in Germany. Every time I looked out the window while traveling through the Saxony countryside I saw enormous wind farms with huge wind turbines.
Not to be outdone, while traveling through the Czech Republic I took this picture of a solar farm. That is a lot of solar panels supplying clean, renewable energy to citizens of the Czech Republic.
Another highlight was passing through Dresden. Almost completely destroyed by an Allied bombing campaign near the end of World War II, the city has been rebuilt since then and is now one of the most important cities in Germany.
Arriving at Dresden's main train station.
We finally arrived in Prague and I set out on exploring the next city on my European rail adventure.
Here is video of the rail trip from Berlin to Prague.
And here are more photos of the rail trip from Berlin to Prague. Click here to see the set on Flickr.
July 17, 2011 -- I took a Deutsche Bahn InterCity-Express train from Brussels to Berlin with a transfer in Cologne. The train makes intermediate stops at Liege and Aachen before reaching Cologne. From Cologne the train makes intermediate stops at Dusseldorf, Duisburg, Essen, Bochum, Dortmund, Hamm, Gutersloh, Bielefeld, Herford, Hannover, Wolfsburg, Stendal and Berlin-Spandau. DB ICE trains travel at speeds up to 200 mph (322 kph).
The train station at Liege, Belgium is spectacular. It was designed by renowned Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, who also designed the new transit hub at Ground Zero in New York City and the Chords Bridge in Jerusalem.
In typical German fashion, Deutsche Bahn wants you to know exactly how fast and efficient their high-speed trains are. The ICE trains top out at around 200 mph (322 kph) so my train was gaining speed at the time I took this picture. For Americans reading this blog post, that is 155 miles per hour.
As we sped through the German countryside I was expecting to see alpine houses and gothic cathedrals, which I did. However, I also saw gigantic wind farms with enormous wind turbines dotting the landscape. And it seemed as if every other house I saw had solar panels installed on the rooftop. Germany is obviously not the windiest or sunniest country in the world, but the Federal Republic has had a Renewable Energy Act in place since the year 2000, so this is the result of over eleven years of generous incentives for wind and solar power. It is impressive to see so many wind farms and so many citizens powering their homes with the sun.
That evening we arrived at the multi-level, futuristic looking Berlin Central Train Station. Trains are coming and going all the time on different levels, making it look like something out of the Fox animated science fiction show "Futurama." So cool.
Here are photos and video of my high speed train trip from Brussels to Berlin. Click here to see the photo set on Flickr.
