January 2014

• ...that Alastair Morton famously coined the phrase that the aftermath of the Hatfield rail crash in 2000 constituted a 'collective nervous breakdown' on the part of the British railway industry?

• ...that Hankyu Railway opened Minami-Ibaraki Station on the Kyoto Line in March 1970 to provide a bus connection for passengers visiting Expo '70, but unlike the temporary Bankokuhaku Nishiguchi Station on the Senri Line, which was open only during the Expo, Minami-Ibaraki Station was built as a permanent station?

• ...that when Meitetsu introduced the 2000 series EMUs in 2004 to serve Central Japan International Airport, trains made up of 2000 series cars were christened μSky (ミュースカイ, myū sukai), a combination of "μTicket" which is Meitetsu's ticket for first class seats plus "sky" in reference to the airport?

• ...that since the Madrid–Valladolid high-speed rail line in Spain opened in 2007, travel times between Madrid Chamartín railway station and Valladolid Campo Grande railway station have been reduced from 2½ hours to 56 minutes with trains traveling at an average of 192 km/h (119 mph)?

• ...that when Via Rail began operation in 1976–1978 it was with a collection of equipment inherited from Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway that has since been supplemented with new orders and new acquisitions of secondhand equipment from other operators?

• ...that all railway stations in Jamaica closed when passenger traffic abruptly ceased in October 1992 but service has resumed on the island as of 2011?

• ...that trains on Line 9 of the Tianjin Metro in China can travel up to 100 km/h (62 mph) which is the fastest of all rapid transit systems in China?

• ...that due to the steepness of the topography, not only was the Lancefield-Kilmore section of the Lancefield railway line in Victoria, Australia, expensive to construct and meandering, it also ran through almost uninhabited land, with little or no passenger custom or freight use, making it one of the most infamous white elephants among the many late-nineteenth century Victorian rail projects?

• ...that some of the EMU cars operated on the Kishigawa Line by Wakayama Electric Railway in Japan have been repainted following designs by industrial designer Eiji Mitooka, who designed the type 9200 "MOMO" tram of Okayama Electric Tramway and trains of JR Kyushu including the 800 Series Shinkansen while others are still in their original Nankai Electric Railway livery?

• ...that as a result of the catastrophic damage following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami to the Kesennuma Line and prohibitive costs of restoration as a railway, much of the line has been converted to bus rapid transit?

• ...that accidents on the Katsuyama Eiheiji Line, in Fukui Prefecture, Japan, in December 2000 and June 2001 forced Keifuku Electric Railroad to close the line leading to its transfer in 2003 to the current operator, Echizen Railway?

• ...that Kanagawa Station on Keikyū's Main Line in Kanagawa-ku, Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, was officially named Aokibashi Station (青木橋駅, Aokibashi-eki) for just six days in 1930?

• ...that although based on the earlier EF53 design, the JNR Class EF55 electric locomotive featured a unique non-symmetrical wheel arrangement with a streamlined cab at one end and a traditional-style cab at the other, which necessitated turning the locomotives when in regular use, a factor that proved to be the downfall for this small class?

• ...that Jamsil Station, on Seoul Metropolitan Subway's lines 2 and 8, was the second busiest public transit stop of the system following Gangnam Station in 2011 and the fourth highest WiFi data consumption of all the Seoul Subway stations in 2010?

• ...that Iyo Railway, which was established in 1887 and is now a core company of Iyotetsu Group, opened its first railway line in 1888, making it the third private railway in Japan and the first railway to operate on the island of Shikoku?

• ...that apart from the JR Tōzai Line, Osaka Municipal Subway's Imazatosuji Line is the only other rail line to cross the Yodo River in Japan via underground tunnels, as the only subway line to do so, and it is also the only subway line in that system to pass entirely outside the Osaka Loop Line, and the only subway line of the Osaka Municipal Transportation Bureau without a connection to the Midōsuji Line?

• ...that H. H. Hunnewell, who served as a director for Illinois Central Railroad and president of two railroads in Kansas, practiced horticulture for nearly six decades on his estate in Wellesley, Massachusetts, where he was perhaps the first person to cultivate and popularize rhododendrons in the United States?

• ...that no through trains are operated over the full length of the Hisatsu Line in Kyushu, Japan, rather trains go from Yatsushiro to Hitoyoshi, from Hitoyoshi to Yoshimatsu, and from Yoshimatsu to Hayato?

• ...that Hetch Hetchy Railroad locomotive number 6, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1978, was the largest of four Shay locomotives and the only three-truck shay operated by the railroad during its regular operations in the early 1920s?

• ...that altogether seven 2140mm Brunel gauge locomotives, including one 0-4-0T, are known to have been employed during construction of the Cape Colony's Table Bay harbour between 1862 and 1904?

• ...that as a commissioner and future chairman of the Interstate Commerce Commission, Henry Clay Hall took the lead on the Commission in the 1914 Shreveport rate case, in which the Commission determined it could regulate intrastate freight, a position that was later upheld by the Supreme Court?

• ...that between mid-2009 and early 2010, segments of the general public and various interest groups opposed to certain aspects of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link Hong Kong Section mobilised through petitions, marches, hunger strikes and rallies to show their discontent at government insistence on pushing through the project?

• ...that as the suburb of Glendalough, Western Australia, was named after the famous monastery of Glendalough in County Wicklow, Ireland, the initial trains on the Transperth Joondalup Line announced Glendalough railway station as "Glenda-lock", rather than the "Glenda-loe" pronunciation that had become common amongst Australian English speakers in Perth?

• ...that in 1899 Gare d'Estrées-Saint-Denis, which is now a station on the TER Picardie service in France, saw 26 passenger trains a day to Compiègne, Verberie, Saint-Just-en-Chaussée, Amiens and Clermont, amounting to 80,000 passengers and 90,000 tonnes of goods traffic annually?

• ...that committed and future railway projects of the Hong Kong MTR will increase the network to over 270 km (170 mi) by 2019 while postponed projects may further increase it to over 300 km (190 mi)?

• ...that St. Louis–San Francisco Railway's (Frisco's) Firefly passenger train, introduced in 1939 over the Kansas City—Tulsa—Oklahoma City route, was intended to compete with the Santa Fe as Frisco's first streamliner?

• ...that despite the Enshū Railway Line's official nickname of Nishi Kajima Line (西鹿島線, Nishi Kajima-sen), locals often call it Akaden (あかでん, "The Red Train") referring to the color of the EMUs operated by Enshū Railway on the line?