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Railways broad and narrow!
Near the present day Soraepogu Station (소래포구) on the current Suin (commuter) line from Oido to Songdo a long bridge of the former narrow gauge Suin line can still be found. This bridge is simply named “Sorae Railway Bridge” (소래철교) and as such can be found on the online Naver, Daum and Google maps. The […]
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The shortest individual stretch on the SuIn line which can still be found is the short part of the line within Suwon city between the main railway line and the Deogyeongdaero (덕영대로). This part of the line was the connection between the line running through Suwon to the station and the country side. The bridge over […]
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While reading an excellent book about the situation in Korea between 1945 and 1950 (“The War for Korea, 1945-1950: A House Burning” by Allan Millett”) I noticed on one of the maps that there were at that time in Korea several narrow gauge railway lines. On the Ongjin peninsula, to the west of Haeju, there […]
Continue ReadingSometimes something just needs to be shown once found. When I recently went through all the available maps at the NVBS cartography library I found this jewel of a map. It shows the full railway system of Denmark in May 1968. The nice thing about such a map is that it shows a lot of […]
Continue ReadingIf you are a fan of railways and cartography, the field of railway cartography must be the best thing there is. And so for many people collecting such maps is a thoroughly addicting hobby! The NVBS Library must therefore be a major Walhalla for anyone who has this hobby, including me. The NVBS Library has […]
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A lot of railways disappeared before 1940, but some disappeared much earlier than that and most of the time without leaving a trace. Looking at recent topographical maps one can see lots of stretches of former railways, but that’s most of the time a recent, standard gauge line through relatively flat country, where the railway […]
Continue ReadingA few years ago I discovered pretty much by accident that NASA World Wind was showing an older series of topographical maps by the USGS through its map server. All of a sudden I discovered abandoned railways all over the US on these maps. One of those railways was the Seward Peninsula Railroad, a line […]
Continue ReadingIf being a railfan is somewhat more eccentric today than it was yesterday, narrow gauge railfanning must be even more eccentric. And like any eccentric hobby, this specific form of railfanning has a diehard following, with people spending a lot of time, energy and money on it. If you’re into this hobby you will know […]
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