The narrowest gauge!

Last week my son and I went on a road-trip. We crossed 5 countries in a day and reached Germany, staying in the town of Wuppertal near Dusseldorf. Outside our hotel in the middle of town a series of girders span the river, supporting this...

This may look like something from a sci-fi movie, but this is a public transport system, the 8-mile long Schwebebahn (or suspension railway) links a series of towns along the river Wupper valley that now form the modern city. It is built mostly over the river itself and opened in 1900, and with a 10-minute service frequency it still carries millions of people a year, having been refurbished a few years ago. 

This is a true monorail. The carriages hang from bogies with two double-flanged wheels in line, running on a single rail on top of the massive longitudinal girders. The electric drive motors are seen on the sides of the bogies, which seem to pick up power from conductor rail(s), but there are no lateral stabilising wheels/rails. The carriages sway slightly as people board but are remarkably stable. Yes, it was trying to snow...

The trains are very modern and I think quite stylish. The carriages are quite narrow and compact, rather like a narrow-gauge train. Two carriages are connected via a short double-hinged centre section, like a bendy-bus, and have a driver's cab at one end only. Doors are only on one side, with two seats across and an aisle/standing room along the side with the doors, except at the rear of the rear coach where a pair of benches face each other with a full-width end window. 

Stations are of course raised up. The central station is a grand stone-built enclosed affair, and some have been rebuilt in modern glass and steel, while some are wood, possibly original. Platforms are usually wood, with a lower level under the hanging trains - presumably to prevent passengers accidentally falling to their deaths. 

We rode to one end of the line where there is a shed (raised up of course) for storing the trains, this also contains a reversing loop. Our train can just be seen with the rear just inside the entrance (right) door, while the front peeks into view in the exit (left) door. Having only one rail, tight curves are clearly no problem, with the train able to turn 180 degrees pretty much in its own length!

Inside the shed other trains could be seen on straight lines, I couldn't quite work out how the "sidings" were accessed but I presume the straight girder (visible on the right of the entrance or left of the exit) slides in place of a curve. It may even act as a traverser? Anyway, after a few minutes our train returned to the station. 

Riding in the rear gives a fabulous view out of the big window of the massive structures that hold up the trains, and how the line follows the river while passing over roads. One of the wooden stations can be seen here, with a footbridge built under it integrated with the access steps to the platforms. It seems such a lot of infrastructure for such small trains, but I guess the same is true of the underground. 

This is a fascinating line and it is great to see it still running after almost 125 years, used by people going about their daily lives. You can even buy a HO scale model apparently - it's probably just as well I didn't come across that while I was there!