Notes

I’m not really certain whether I like this image. It could be worse when seen on it’s one, but the particular scene looks better from just about any different angle.

Anyway, the Regional Express from Bad Harzburg to Hanover is just leaving Oker station for Goslar, which will be a five minute ride in total. The train is a classic Silberling trainset, pushed by a class 218. The signals it’s passing are all classic semaphores (with LED lighting, though). The ones on the right have the newer, simpler mast, which was later also used for light signals, but the one most on the left has the older, finer pre-war mast which costs ten euro more if you buy the signal in TT. The railroads of the region Braunschweig have a reputation of being very aware of traditions, or to be more precise, keeping old stuff longer than most others.

The tower between the middle and right semaphore, on the other hand, is very new. It’s a GSM-R tower, which is the new standard for railroad radio in Germany and soon all of Europe. As the name implies, it’s based on the GSM mobile telephony standard, but improved for rail systems. DB was very quick adopting it, it’s used on almost all lines in Germany now, and will be used on absolutely all pretty soon. Last but not least, between the left and middle semaphore you’ll see one of the few remaining chimneys of Oker’s former lead works, which is a different story altogether.