1929 Morris 4-door sedan graphic art

'I like to get comfortable and then read a good real book'

steam passenger train between the main Singapore and the Kranji station, 1900s

Singapore-Kranji Railway

The first period of Singapore’s railway history refers to the planning and realisation of the Singapore-Kranji Railway by the then colonial government. On 16 April 1900, then Acting Governor Alexander Swettenham “cut the first sod” at the site of the Tank Road station to commence works for the line.2 A year before, the Legislative Council had approved Cecil Clementi Smith’s plan to build a railway through the island. Although the station at Tank Road became the “Singapore terminus”, there were earlier plans to route the line on the other side of Government Hill (Fort Canning) and to commence service at the end of Orchard Road near Dhoby Ghaut, but it was eventually altered. It was probably the high cost of the real estate there that led to the change in the plans.

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1950s Armstrong-Vickers advertisment featuring a Vickers Viscount and a jet fighter

Chongqing, China -- where a metro line goes through a whole apartment block

MyBestPlace - Chongqing, A Subway Passing Through a Building

Uruguay 2-6-0

As can be seen, the rear of this cigarette trading card from the 1930s makes no mention of the locomotive at all, however, it seems to depict an N class, see here for info.

trans-Australian Railway centennial first day cover, 4 July 2017

See earlier posts. 

cars on Phillips Ave South, Sioux Falls. South Dakota, 1958

(attributed to Charles Cushman)

for VW Beetle fans -- a tissue dispenser

Available commercially in a variety of paint schemes, about $40. 

1973 Steyr Puch Haflinger off-roader

More pics and info

an open day visit to the Apakov tram depot in Moscow

With a range of different trams.

'give me a real book over a battery device anytime'

poster for the Eastern & Oriental Express, 1990s

The Eastern & Oriental Express is a luxury 'cruise' train on meter-gauge track that carries passengers between Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand that has operated since the 1990s.

More info

SNCF station with a passenger train graphic art, 1960s

Probably a wall poster for schools. It shows a BB 16000 class electric locomotive from 1958, which were the AC current version of the BB 9200 class.

More info

1980 Volvo models

2-door and 4-door sedans and a station wagon.

model of an 0-4-0 ST Hunslet narrow gauge industrial steam locomotive

 

These were typically used in quarrying, the short wheelbase indicating use on extra tight curves.

Info

cars outside the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia, 1967

At the time the city was named Leningrad. After the collapse of communism in 1991 the name was changed back to the original.

The Hermitage is arguably Russia's best known museum.

1963 Sunbeam Alpine Series III GT

It had probably more pronounced fins (in proportion) than American cars had by that stage.

More pics and info

1911 Aberdonia

The Aberdonia was manufactured in Park Royal, London from 1911 to 1915 by coachbuilders Brown, Hughes and Strachan. The engine was a 3160 cc, 4 cylinder, side valve unit. It cost £500 with seven-seated touring coachwork, or £700 with “special landau body”.

At the 1911 London Motor Show a one-off design, mid-engined and forward-control with the driver ahead of the engine was displayed.

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Pan Am is back, kind of

 This arrived in our e-mail:

Pan Am Travel, 23091 Mill Creek Drive, Laguna Hills, California 92653, 949-614-8000

1965 Vauxhall Victor 101 Super

With a 'Powerglide' badge on the trunk.

'good real books are my thing, not little electronic screens'

1961 Henschel HS 120 truck

The red star on the grille suggests it was being used behind the iron curtain?

two version of The Cab, 1928

The Carry the Dame by footmen version was probably for rocky or muddy paths.

cars and buses in Mayakovsky Square, Moscow, early 1960s

"Mayakovsky Square in Moscow was originally named Triumfalnaya Square but was renamed in the 1930s to honor the poet Vladimir Mayakovsky. A monument to Mayakovsky, created by Aleksandr Kibalnikov, was erected on the square in 1958. The square has since returned to its original name, Triumfalnaya Square, while the monument remains."

Present day view

1965 Rambler Marlin

 

The first year of production. More info

1935 Bentley 3.5L Saloon

More info

SNCB class 49 railcar

Originally type 553, 50 were built in 1942 and were all withdrawn by 1971. 2 have been preserved.

More info

a visit to a Russian car and motorbike show, April 2025

 

As readers are probably aware, the Biden administration and the EU made Russia the world's most sanctioned country in 2022, but it doesn't seem to have made a lot of difference to everyday life for most people.

a night scene in Santa Fe's Argentine, Kansas, freight yard, 1943

One of Jack Delano's great photos.

1970 Marcos 2L Coupe

'I love looking for good real books to read'

travel by ship on Lake Päijänne, Finland, poster, 1930

Lake Päijänne is the second largest lake in Finland at 1,080 km2 (266,874 acres). The lake drains into the Gulf of Finland via the Kymi River.  There are still several ships that operate on it in the summer months for tourists.

Kar-Air poster, Finland, 1957

The airline Karhumäki Airways was founded in 1947, but challenging the then state monopoly was not easy since the authorities favored Aero in many ways. In June 1951 scheduled services began between Helsinki and Joensuu, Jyväskylä, Vaasa and Sundsvall. Initially operating on domestic routes with a fleet of four Douglas DC-3 and two Convair CV-440 Metropolitan airliners, the first international flight (to Stockholm) took place in 1951, which was followed by holiday flights to Málaga. Soon it was the first in Finland to offer charter flights to the south.  The name was shortened to Kar-Air in 1956. It ceased in 1996, merging into Finnair.

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traffic in Calle Sarandi, Montevideo, Uruguay, 1920s

 Electric trams in Montevideo ran from 1906 to 1957.

Chicago rail freight yard, 1950s

Linke Hofmann Busch-built new diesel trains for Mexico and Germany, 1953

This promo photo shows two new diesel trains built in Germany by Linke Hofmann Busch. It was LHB's first order for such trains after 1945, consisting of articulated diesel sets for the Ferrocarril del Sur Este in Mexico -- in reality, a replica of the Reichsbahn's "Schnelltriebwagen" (high speed railcar), but with a top speed of 120 km/h. Six such trains were built.

Next to it is the Deutsche Bundesbahn's "Senator" diesel train (VT 10 501). Fine looking, but a total mistake. Delivered shortly before the German Transport Exhibition of 1953, the first problems occurred on the way from Salzgitter to Munich. After the exhibition, the DB was planning to use this train on the Frankfurt--Hamburg route, but only a year later the first regular run was made and two months later the train was stopped again after repeated failures. New and unsuccessful trials followed, and in 1959 the "Senator" train was out of use. It was finally scrapped in 1963, making a comeback in 2008 as an HO scale model by Marklin, (Historical Railway Images)

James May's trip with a companion in a driverless Waymo car in L.A.

 Would you want to do this?  

The Waymo website

cars outside the Brown Derby restaurant, Los Angeles, 1959

This is 3347 Wilshire Boulevard; the building in the center is still there and the Gayford Hotel is now the Gayford Apartments; the landmark Brown Derby with the bowler hat styling closed suddenly in 1980 and was replaced.

1930 International Harvester McCormick-Deering tractor advertisement

Asopos Gorge Bridge, Greece, trading card, 1937

More info and here