the alpine railway town of Modane, France

FS class E636 locos (see earlier post)

Situated at over 1 km in altitude, this town is close to the border with Italy and both road and rail have tunnels known as the Tunnel du Fréjus, see earlier posts.  Freight trains from both France and Italy can be seen in the yard here and a changeover of electric locomotives from the 1,500 Volts DC of the system in this part of France to the 3,000 V DC of the Italian system.  It is also on the route of TGVs from Paris to Turin (and Milan).  The town's population was 3,400 in 2012.