For anyone with a few minutes on hand today

[whole diary]

[johnneyw]

6.  Reminds me of the U3 on Monkedamm between Rodingsmarkt and Baumwall in Hamburg.  It certainly looks similar but it's been a few years now.

[stuving]

Have you realised that no. 6 is another "oops"? That cute little train has "Hochbahn" on its nose, strongly implying it's it's running on Hamburg U3. Here it's descending from Rödingsmarkt into a swamp at Mönkedamm. I think this section is now open again, having been closed last year for rebuilding (of the swamp).

[grahame]

Just two remain to be identified.   Correct answers so far:

1: Douglas, IoM^‡(resolve) - OxonHutch
2:
3: Wexford - eightonedee
4: Brisol Docks / Floating Harbour - ellendune
5: Keynsham - AMLAG
6: Hamburg - johnneyw and stuving
7:
8: Oviedo - stuving
9: Newquay - old original
10: Portland, Main - OxonHutch and ellendune
11: Chur - PhilWakely
12: Weymouth - bradshaw

[Clan Line]

7.  Forth Worth, Texas.

[grahame]

7.  Forth Worth, Texas.

Texas for sure - maybe Fort Worth for all I would know

[stuving]

2: Gela.

[grahame]

2: Gela.

Indeed - on Scicily.  And that's the final place identified. In the 1 black and whites of Christmas.

[Clan Line]

Texas for sure - maybe Fort Worth for all I would know

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6BwZ-4yumM&t=38s&ab_channel=CBSSundayMorning

[stuving]

2: Gela.

Indeed - on Scicily. 

You might think a little old railmotor like that had been pottering about on Sicily since it was built in the 80s. But no - part of the process of locating it was finding a report* that it moved from Treviso to Catania in May this year, and then started operating between Gela and Siracusa. And Treviso is up north of Venice!

*on a site that keeps track of the hundreds of these ALn 668 things: you find those railway enthusiasts everywhere! 

[grahame]

2: Gela.

Indeed - on Scicily. 

You might think a little old railmotor like that had been pottering about on Sicily since it was built in the 80s. But no - part of the process of locating it was finding a report* that it moved from Treviso to Catania in May this year, and then started operating between Gela and Siracusa. And Treviso is up north of Venice!

*on a site that keeps track of the hundreds of these ALn 668 things: you find those railway enthusiasts everywhere! 

Fascinating ... I had arrived in Gela on this service from Siracusa and it had felt like it was out of the ark and had been there for ever. We left Siracusa full and standing and lost passengers along the way until there were just a handful of us by Gela.  We lost time along the way as we interacted with engineering works, then waited in  a loop for a train coming the other way so that it could maintain time and connections (there were no immediate onward connections off our train, so it was logical to delay it further).  The conductor advised us that we woud be at that intermediate unstaffed statioon for a while, and that we would make sure to call us back before it left (rail-aware, I had my ear and eyes open for the train coming the other way anyway).   It's that friendliness and locallity of single car trains - no "mass" of mass transit that makes longer trains impersonal - that brings a love for this sort of train / service.

I suppose we should not be surprised at the movement of these things around a nation.  153s that were familiar to us in Melksham will turn up now at Fishguard or Crewe, and there's five of them in the West Highlands. We outgrew the 153s at Melksham and that's really a good thing - the economics of maintaing a line just for a single 153 are dubious but there is still a historic love for what Casper and his friends brought us.   Casper would be welcome back to provide a "contra" service - leaving Swindon ten minutes after the tine the grown up train leaves Westbury, and leaving Westbury ten minutes before the grown up train leaves Swindon.