Those landscape images bear a striking resemblance to Albert Bierstadt's paintings of the American West[1], but I don't want to go pointing fingers...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_works_by_Albert_Bierst...
The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
181–190 of 215 posts
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#182Sleeper trains make so much sense for travel over land. They are often competitively priced with air travel, they pollute a lot less and the time saved can be huge when you consider that you spend time travelling when you would otherwise be asleep (although this is sometimes true for air travel, many/most people find it difficult to get quality sleep in economy class). The London - Edinburgh sleeper train (Caledonian…
I've taken the Amtrak Autotrain from DC to Florida many times with a car and family. It is somewhat expensive (about $2,200 roundtrip for a family of four and car) and very unpleasant but I keep WISHING this time will be different...the US sleeping cars are ancient and covered in a film of grime. The tracks in the Carolinas are very rough and bumpy, sleep is difficult. Maybe someday we'll have sleeping cars like this but I think we'll have luxury self-driving sleeping buses displace America's terrible sleeping car rail option.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#183As a side note recently traveled from US to Austria. I was blown away by how clean, beautiful and affordable the country is. But we can’t have the things they have over there cuz “who is gonna pay for it”?
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess I wouldn’t have thought that expensive for intercity travel. Certainly doesn’t strike me as such relative to shorter haul European trains I’ve taken. And in the US, I’m a decent fraction of that ($13) just to take the commuter rail into the city one way.
Same here, I've taken the London to Edinburgh on LNER and Virgin East Coast multiple times and it runs about £40 each way. And my 30 mile train into Manhattan is $14 $36 one way for a 5 hour train seems pretty cheap.
An anytime return London Edinburgh £323, off peak £238, super off peak £147. Anytime first class return is £504.
Regardless of what you think of these fares (it is cheaper if you book in advance), considering HMRC allows you to write off 45p/mile and it is slightly over 800 miles, only the anytime return is really more expensive if travelling for work vs a car. Plus you'll have £30-40/day parking in central london on top, so apart from the first class return the train (even at its most eye wateringly expensive) is cheaper than a car.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that the train has to compete with 3 hours by car... And then the ability to actually use a car at your destination. The transit systems in either Seattle, or Portland, are nowhere near as good as they are in New York.
If you factor in wear and tear, parking, etc. It’s probably still cheap. You can also rent a car when you get there for something like the same amount for the day and not worry about the wear and tear part.
Much of my car's wear and tear is from age, so I can discount some amount of that that. Free parking is plentiful in 95% of both cities.
Driving 1 person is already close to the price of a train ticket. Driving 2 people is ~50% discounted. Driving 2 people, and then not having to rent a car/taxi, is something like a ~75% discount.
With a real carbon tax, these numbers would look a lot closer to eachother.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#186Having travelled a couple of times on overnight trains from Austria to other European cities, these sleeping pods look marginally a larger improvement. - Tempeature: Having slept in a cabin where the aircon blasts from the bottom into those sleeping there, they inevitably have to turn it off to sleep, leaving those on the top bunks at temperatures of over 40C in the summer. - Noise/Privacy: In the 4-bunk cabins, I do…
> why they can't just make lightweight carriages
I would be very surprised if the carriages were any heavier than they had to be. Why would they waste energy costs (and engine size costs) on dragging around weight they didn't have to?
I'm sure that weight improvements could be made, but I'm also sure that it would cost money and rolling stock is expensive enough.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#187Slightly off-topic, but couldn't help but notice on the Projects list a really cool version of the London tube. Unfortunately it seems it's from 2014 (there's even some quote from Boris as Mayor), so probably scrapped by now? Makes me wonder if these Austrian train designs are already set in stone or just a proposal that might or might not happen.
That design is extremely close to the new design of train in use on the circle line. The seating arrangement is a little different and they use monochrome LED signboards rather than LCD (for sensible reasons), but the continuous unobstructed design is there, along with actual aircon.
It's an impressive sight to look from one end of the interior to the other when it's not full of people (and going straight).
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#188I slept on a fair number of sleeper trains during multiple trips to China. It’s basically the most popular way to get around the country. A few years ago, Xuzhou-Xi’an, a 10 hour trip, was priced at 315¥ (around $50 USD) for each “soft bed” (four soft beds to a room), which was perfect for a travelling family.
Recently, the high-speed rail lines have started to shift things in favor of daytime trips between large cities (Beijing-Xuzhou used to be 7 hours by sleeper train, but it’s now 2.5 hours by bullet train). But, the train remains the best way to travel within the country. It’s smooth, quite cheap (esp. for an American traveler), and increasingly comfortable.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#189Sleeper trains make so much sense for travel over land. They are often competitively priced with air travel, they pollute a lot less and the time saved can be huge when you consider that you spend time travelling when you would otherwise be asleep (although this is sometimes true for air travel, many/most people find it difficult to get quality sleep in economy class). The London - Edinburgh sleeper train (Caledonian…
> They are often competitively priced with air travel
Not at all. London-Edinburgh is £65 on EasyJet and a 1 hour trip. A regular seat on the Caledonian Express is £45 for an 8 hour trip. The Caledonian Express en suite twin room is £280.00
> when you consider that you spend time travelling when you would otherwise be asleep
I could fly Easy Jet for 1 hour for £65, and have money left over for a very comfortable hotel and a nice meal.
Re: The New Austrian Railways' Intercity and Nightjet Sleeper Train Interior Design
#190Österreichische Bundesbahnen (ÖBB) took over all remaining sleepers run by Deutsche Bahn (DB) some years ago. One downside of this was the dropping of the Amsterdam–Munich sleeper — ÖBB's nexus lies in Vienna. The Netherlands currently has no sleeper trains, which is rather unfortunate, because the sleeper train appears to gaining in popularity after a period of decline. Increasingly, people want to avoid flying if r…
Taking even a half decent train is worth it if it means avoiding the airport security theater. Also, anyone else get annoyed with tons of shops at airports? I think of airports as mega malls with some planes attached to them :(
> Also, anyone else get annoyed with tons of shops at airports?
I love it. Frankfurt duty free is pretty much my favorite shopping mall. The shops also give you something to do when you're waiting for connections. Duty Free in Dubai is also a lot of fun. Those shops also bring in revenue which goes to running the airport (your airline ticket is indirectly subsidized by those shops.)