Saturday, August 31, 2019

Fiat 600 Multipla promo pic circa 1956


"We're all going to squeeze in here - impressed?"
"It's all right if you're short and slim."
"Gawd, four of us have to fit in the back"
"Don't complain, it will be intimate."
"But uncomfortable"
"We need to be inventive with our positions"
"You always say that, dear."

Pacific Electric trolley #331, Birney Safety Car


This 4-wheel car was built in 1918 by J.G. Brill Car Company and was operated occasionally until it was withdrawn from service in 1940. 

It was firstly preserved by Metro Goldwyn-Mayer from 1940 to 1966 then at the Orange Empire Railway Museum at Perris, California from 1966 to the present.
Length: 24'6" (7.5 metres); Width:7'11" (2.4 metres); Height: 10'2" (3.1 metres); Weight:14,700 pounds (6.7 tonnes); Seats:32; Trucks: Brill 78M1; Motors:GE 258C (2); Total horsepower: 50. 

Egyptian class AA22T diesel-electric


A total 280 of this Co-Co type were built by Henschel with GM engines and introduced in 1976.  The engine output is 2,475 hp (1,845 kW) and the locomotive weight is 121-122 tons.

According to locomotion.fandom.com: "A total of 99 examples of the basic AA22T version (75 mph/120 km/h gearing) were delivered (3016-3084, 3241-3270); the AA22T (50 mph/80 km/h gearing for heavy freight work) totals 56 locomotives (3001-3015, 3189-3200 and 3271-3299); the AA22T-2, 125 of which were supplied between 1981 and 1990, features various improvements and if geared for 87 mph/140 km/h running for passenger work (3085-3188, 3201-3221)."  This one was seen in Cairo in 2017.

Friday, August 30, 2019

narrow gauge 0-6-0 steam locomotive 'Waldenburg', Switzerland



Built for the Waldenburgbahn in 1912. The gauge was 750 mm which is a bit short of 2'6" and the narrowest in Switzerland.

Union Pacific AC44CW


A pair of them on an autorack rack train near Frost, California 15 years ago.

Thursday, August 29, 2019

a felucca voyage down the Nile, Egypt


"We headed off toward outcroppings of gray stone rounded smooth by thousands of years of water lapping against them. Always in the distance, perched above us in a barren landscape, stood the Aga Khan Mausoleum.

"The Jellika had no motor — she was entirely dependent upon the wind. We’d cruise along slowly, calmly, for most of the ride, though there were moments when the breeze would pick up and we’d gain a considerable amount of speed.

"We rounded Elephantine Island, its temple ruins visible in glimpses. Some say the island got its name from the large rocks at one end that aren’t too difficult to imagine as bathing pachyderms — though it might have more to do with the fact that it was once an outpost of the ivory trade."

1964 Riley 4/Seventy-two


1936 Chevrolet 4-door sedan


SP steamer at Deming, NM, in 1912


The road number isn't clear, but could be 2280 which would make it a 'Ten Wheeler' Class T-25 4-6-0.

1993 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham


Sunday, August 25, 2019

fishing boats in Whitby, England, late 19th century


tram and truck in Fribourg, Swizterland, 1956


The 6-km (3.7 mile) long electric tram network lasted from 1897 to 1965. From 1949 the trams were steadily replaced with the Fribourg trolleybus system.

What is the truck?

ambulance being manoeuvred through a building wall, Poland


Which just raises the question - why?

the Sursee-Triengen-Bahn, Switzerland

Locomotive ST1, a 0-4-0T from the railway's beginning seen circa 1960.
An 0-6-0 type in present use.

The ST line map; the maximum gradient is 1.5%

This standard gauge private railway was founded in 1912 for passenger transport and has been run as a public limited company. Unusually for Switzerland, it was never electrified. In the early 1970s passenger transport over the 8.9 km between Sursee and Triengen was moved from rail to road. Since then, the railway line has been used for freight transport as well as for the operation of a heritage steam railway.

In September 2018, the ownership of an SBB (Swiss Federal Railways) line was handed over to private hands for the first time in several years: the Sursee-Triengen-Bahn which until then only operated in Surental (Suren Valley) took over the Hinwil-Bäretswil railway line in the Zurich Oberland.

Friday, August 23, 2019

migrant ships 'Duchess of Argyle' and 'Jane Gifford'


An oil painting by Roger Morris. "The Duchess of Argyle arrived in Auckland in 1842, a few hours before the Jane Gifford and was boarded by the senior pilot who managed to run her aground. Later that evening the junior pilot boarded the 'Jane' which passed the 'Duchess' who was still aground waiting for the full tide to lift her off. The ship's boat is making depth soundings and Rangitoto Island is in the background. Duchess of Argyle was Auckland's first emigrant ship."

Algoma Central Railway, Canada


This postcard is of an Algoma Agawa Canyon Tour Train on the trestle over the Montreal River at mile 92 north of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario: 130' (40 metres) high and 1550' (472 metres) in length.

"The Algoma Central Railway (reporting mark AC) is a railway in Northern Ontario that operates between Sault Ste. Marie andHearst. It formerly also had a branch line to Wawa, Ontario (Formerly known as the township of Michipicoten) The area served by the railway is sparsely populated, with few roads. The railway is well known for its Agawa Canyon tour train and also provides passenger train service along its entire route to canoeists, snowmobilers, cottagers and tourists accessing this wilderness recreation region. The railway connects at its northernmost point with the Ontario Northland Railway and with CN's eastern division to the south. It also intersects with the Canadian Pacific Railway at Franz and with the Huron Central Railway at its southernmost point in the Sault."

More

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

cars on Highway 90, Biloxi, Missisippi, early 1960s


Vodafone NZ's e-mail forwarding ends today

In November 2017, Vodafone NZ closed its servers for customer e-mails, but began forwarding ones that people sent to them to whatever new addresses customers advised them of.

Today that forwarding service ends, so any customer still with our paradise.net.nz address in their address book should delete it and replace it with the one contained on our main website homepage

automobiles on rails, Hungary



Monday, August 19, 2019

cars and a bus outside Campbell's Motors, New Plymouth, NZ, 1930s


What are they?

bridge with a central lift section over the Taruheru River, Gisborne, NZ, 110 years ago


The counterweights as pulleys made the process of lifting it easier.   There was obviously river traffic at that time requiring such a bridge; there isn't now.

traffic and tram on the Götaälvbron, Göteborg, Sweden, circa 1960


Known in English as Gothenburg, and this is the bridge over the Gota River. This was obviously before the switch to right hand side driving in 1967.  The skyline has been added to in the intervening years.

VR diesel and steam classes in Ballarat, Australia, 1960s


S306 on the left obviously has a passenger train on the couplings; J518 could be on the front of a goods train.  The loco behind the J looks like an R class.  See earlier posts.

Friday, August 16, 2019

1959 Imperial LeBaron 4-door Silvercrest Landau

"Does this dress show off my figure?"
"No. It looks like a sack for potatoes."

Ural Airlines Airbus A321 crash lands in a field after birds get into jet engines


Moscow — A passenger jet made an emergency landing in a field outside of one of Moscow's airports Thursday after colliding with a flock of birds, injuring dozens of people, Russian officials said. The Ural Airlines A321 carrying 226 passengers and a crew of seven hit the birds as it took off Thursday from Moscow's Zhukovsky airport en route for Simferopol, in Crimea.

The airline said in a statement that the birds got into both of the plane's engines, causing them to malfunction. The pilot then made an emergency landing in a cornfield about half a mile from the airport.

Russia's Ministry of Health said 55 people received medical assistance on the scene and 29 were taken to an area hospital, including 10 children and one pregnant woman. Only one woman was kept hospitalized, however, and her condition was assessed as moderate.


It recalls the emergency in New York when the same thing happened to a US Airways flight on 15 January 2009 requiring the plane's pilots to 'land' on the Hudson River -- details

Thursday, August 15, 2019

1920 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost


$806 million contract will bring L.A.'s Metro Gold Line to Pomona


Metro’s Gold Line is on its way to Pomona, after the agency tasked with constructing an extension of the light rail line approved an $806 million contract with builder Kiewit-Parsons to add 9 miles [14.5 km] to the existing route.

That’s short of the 12.3-mile [19.8 km] project originally planned, which would have reached Claremont and the San Bernardino County city of Montclair. But construction costs proved higher than anticipated, forcing Metro and the Foothill Gold Line Construction Authority to break up the project into two parts.

The authority initially proposed temporarily ending the line in La Verne, near the Los Angeles County Fairplex. But last week, San Gabriel Valley leaders unanimously agreed to spend $126 million to close a funding gap for the rail project, allowing the first phase of construction to reach Pomona.

If money becomes available later, local leaders will have the option to tack an additional $381 million onto the value of the contract in order to bring the train to Montclair, as originally planned. They’ll have to act quickly though; that provision expires in two years.

“This is a crucial project for not only our residents in the San Gabriel Valley, but for all of Southern California,” Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis said in a statement last week.

More than $1 billion in Measure M funding is devoted to the project already, but the construction authority revealed last year that wouldn’t be enough to complete the project originally envisioned.

Right now, the Gold Line runs between East LA and Azusa, though the northern and southern portions of the route will be divided up once Metro’s Regional Connector project wraps up in 2022.

Wednesday, August 14, 2019

1949 Nash Airflyte


passenger train at Newmarket, Auckland, early 20th century


What looks like an A class 'Pacific' on the front; probably a helper has been taken off.  The number of cars suggests it is a Main Trunk express. For lots more, see our books,