Jon Worth Profile picture
Jul 30, 2022 41 tweets 21 min read Read on X
Welcome to #CrossBorderRail Day 38 - Timisoara to Poprad (hopefully) twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1…
This isn’t Timisoara
This track doesn’t look very good. What happened there?
Now in the seating carriage Timisoara onwards towards Hungary. It’s air conditioned, sort of. I’m the only passenger 😷. People are coughing.

At Lőkösháza on the Hungarian side of the border more carriages are added, so I can hopefully escape this one.
Sought refuge by the door. Sure the safety alarms me. But I have air!
Timișoara is Romania’s third largest city. But its rail infra is - even by Romanian standards - dire. Single track lines, low speeds. Although at least electrified…
I’m so done with this shit. There are now passengers smoking in the vestibules. The two old CFR geezers sat in the carriage here do nothing. They’re underpaid. The rail network underfunded. No one gives a damn.
The only train I took in Romania that was on time was the Nadlac-Arad branch line (that had a speed of 32km/h). On lines like Giurgiu-Videle-Bucharest, Simeria-Targu Jiu, and Bucuresti-Timisoara I’m not even sure trains can run to time even if nothing goes wrong on the day.
Ah it’s another #CrossBorderRail timetable fail 😩

IC 194 Budapest - Miskolc - Kosice arrives 2 mins *after* the fast train to Poprad departs…
And responses like this are infuriating. Sure, there are technical reasons for things. But if you can’t get the train to Kosice 5 mins earlier, can you get the one for Poprad to leave 5 mins later? When a train crosses a border no one does any thinking to overcome this.
Szolnok

And COFFEEEEEEE!
Forgot this last night… arrived today!

#CrossBorderRail Train 130
IRD 78 22:02 Bucuresti N - Szolnok 11:26
Ave speed: 51 km/h
Operator: CFR & MÁV

Train type: CFR loco then MÁV loco. 6 carriages to Timisoara, then 3 to HU
⚡️
🚲: ⛔️ (possible only in 🇭🇺)
🦽: ⛔️
📶: ⛔️
🍽: ⛔️
The very retro sleeping car Bucuresti-Timisoara. No air con. Comfy bed though! #fensterauf
Szolnok station
Outside Szolnok station
Off go a bunch of postcards to @AdinaValean from last week - I had Hungarian stamps but had forgotten to post these!
Needing a train that’s easy to board has many forms

The microwave oven fits into the railbus. Just!
Szolnok station
Szolnok around the station
Looking back towards the station. The scale of the rail infra here is massive
Earlier in #CrossBorderRail I was impressed by MÁV’s IC+ bicycle carriage…
Today’s train has one of those, and a combined 1st class / snack point carriage. This is equally clever. Info points in compartments, electric sockets everywhere, even the toilet is well designed
The snack point isn’t a full dining car, but there is warm food if you want it. And decent coffee. Here’s the menu - in Hungarian
I also investigated the disabled access in the combined bike / wheelchair accessible carriage. The ramp is on board, so isn’t dependent on the station having one
The problem with IC+?

No level boarding. These are classic high floor 200km/h InterCity / EuroCity carriages

But they’re about the best EuroCity carriages I’ve seen. They’re almost as good as a Railjet
#CrossBorderRail Train 131
IC 656 “Tokaj” 13:38 Szolnok - Miskolc Tiszai 16:27
Ave speed: 91 km/h
Operator: MÁV

Train type: V43 locomotive & 5 carriages
⚡️
🚲: ✅ (and it’s good! eBike charging and pump)
🦽: ✅ (ramp on board)
📶: ✅ (good snack point)
🍽: ✅
Also I realise the tweet above was a bit unclear. 1st class in IC+ is 3 across compartments. The 2 across (shown) is the “1st plus” class that requires an extra supplement
It’s hammering down at Hajdúszoboszló 🇭🇺 and we’re 45 minutes late… My connection in Miskolc for Kosice 🇸🇰 is going to be long gone. But I should still get the final train of the day to Slovakia and on to Poprad Tatry…
A few pics from Bulgaria

Railway firms rivalling state incumbent BDZ use a range of different second hand locomotives - here are two ex-DSB EA class (1 Bulmarket, 1 DB Cargo Bulgaria), 1 ex-UK class 92 (DB Cargo Bulgaria), 1 ex-UK class 87 (operator unknown - poss. GFR BG?)
A few drone pictures from Svilengrad 🇧🇬
And some #FensterAuf pics from en route, inc. the guard signalling to the driver to start at a station… while leaning out!
Crossing the Danube into Romania, Giurgiu Nord (the border station), and a fellow passenger so keen to get her connecting train in Bucuresti Nord she had the door open long before we even got to the platform!
And I’ve re-planned Monday - the final regular day of #CrossBorderRail

Two rail replacement buses in Sachsen and Brandenburg is more than I can stomach. So I’m routing Liberec 🇨🇿 to Dresden instead of to Görlitz

Will write it all up later!
Approaching Miskolc 🇭🇺 more than an hour late… after having taken this train because I’d missed the earlier one as the Timisoara 🇷🇴 - Szolnok 🇭🇺 train was also late… So total delay is c. 3 hours

But the rain stopped. And on board info on MÁV IC+ carriages is very good
Classic motive power at Miskolc Tiszai - the V43 was built in 1968. And wherever I go in Hungary there are rail buses!
Tiszai is a nice old station
And more postcards have been sent on their way to @AdinaValean - from Bucuresti. Thanks @ChrisFrean @bucharestlife @PaliparanDotCom for both the good conversation and saving me a trip to a post office yesterday! ☺️
The #ConnectingEurope express lives! Or at least the MÁV baggage carriage from it does. At Miskolc-Tiszai.
#CrossBorderRail Train 132
IC 186 18:30 Miskolc-Tiszai - Kosice 19:59
Ave speed: 59 km/h
Operator: MÁV & ŽSSK

Train type: V43 locomotive & 3 ŽSSK carriages
⚡️
🚲: ⛔️ (no bike place, I checked - but there are 🎿 racks!
🦽: ⛔️ (no wheelchair place or toilet)
📶: ✅
🍽: ⛔️
#CrossBorderRail Train 132
Os 1764 20:32 Kosice - Poprad Tatry 21:52
Ave speed: 75 km/h
Operator: ŽSSK

Train type: ČSD EM 488.0
⚡️
🚲: ⛔️ (but can be put by the doors)
🦽: ⛔️ (I can see no way)
📶: ⛔️
🍽: ⛔️
Spišské Vlachy

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More from @jonworth

Dec 11, 2022
This morning I’m one of the first new regional trains Maubeuge 🇫🇷 - Charleroi Central 🇧🇪 #CrossBorderRail
It was a bit of a #fail at the station. I needed a ticket to Erquelinnes, the first station in Belgium. But prior to today trains from Maubeuge didn’t stop there!

Ticket machine ⛔️
Ask at the ticket office. “Le train ne s’arrête pas à Erquelinnes!” I politely told the SNCF employee that yes, it did stop at Erquelinnes. I explained the situation to the SNCB train manager and he laughed, confirmed it did stop there, and I bought the ticket online!
Read 8 tweets
Dec 10, 2022
Signal failure south of Fulda. Looks like I could miss the event in Mons I’m organising 😭
Delays in my favour. Maybe? S-Bahn to FFM Flughafen. Get a late running ICE to Köln Messe/Deutz there. Then try to blag my way onto a Thalys Köln Hbf to Bruxelles? It’s a long shot but it might work…
ICE 612 Frankfurt Flughafen to Köln Messe/Deutz.

This is why accurate live running data in apps matters. Were this not running 10 min late I’d not have caught it… but live data allowed me to plan a connection that’d otherwise not work
Read 12 tweets
Dec 1, 2022
Already on the 2nd train of the day: TGV Montbard - Paris. All being well I’ll be in Denmark tonight… but that feels a long way off just now! #EGPCongress #crossborderrail
Across Paris RER Gare de Lyon to Gare du Nord, walk to Gare de l’Est (faster than changing into a Métro to Est) and it’s onto the TGV to Mannheim. So far so good, but I banked on this bit working 🙂 #EGPCongress #CrossBorderRail
Franco-German train service. Very French prices! And no, it’s too early (and expensive) for #beerontrains 😉
Read 16 tweets
Nov 30, 2022
Tomorrow hundreds of delegates - myself included (from 🇫🇷) - will start their trip to @europeangreens congress in København

Most of us will go by 🚆
Many trips will be disrupted as railways are a mess

But there’s nothing about transport on the programme europeangreens.eu/congress2022/p…
I don’t blame @europeangreens for this, short term. They only have on their programme what member parties want.

But there isn’t the fierce debate or intellectual exchange in the Green movement about transport as there is about other issues.
Given CO2 emissions in transport are still rising (unlike in other sectors) that ought to be a matter for urgent attention from Greens.

And hell, the event is in København, a paradise for 🚲. There’d be opportunities to use that as a hook.
Read 4 tweets
Nov 17, 2022
Talking #9euroTicket at #PassengerFest - slightly frustrating that it’s DB talking about it. Other views are available 😉
“Did behaviour change in the way the government intended?” asks the moderator. Ha. Did the government even *know* what its intention was?
Oh and the DB dude is saying it was too cheap. As he would. Poorer citizens would say otherwise… zeit.de/mobilitaet/202…
Read 5 tweets
Nov 12, 2022
😭 Germany builds a high speed line through Baden-Württemberg - to speed up Stuttgart-München services

It’s been in planning for *years*

But SNCF’s TGVs used for Paris-Stuttgart-München services haven’t been updated to be compatible with the new line!

swr.de/swraktuell/bad…
Jeez. It could take until 2025 until TGVs are approved for the line.

And the whole effing point of Stuttgart21 - of which this line is a part - was to create a Paris-München high speed corridor!

Really, how can everyone mess up *so badly*?
And to those going “yeah but there are few TGVs anyway” true, but so it goes on and on. International services are the lowest priority - even when *they were the stated rationale for building the line*
Read 4 tweets

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