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The chaos in the Netherlands was pretty widespread, I was just fortuitously exempted from it. All intercity trains were cancelled from Sunday to today but the good old sturdy IC from Berlin made it through (the longest delay we had was due to waiting for a connection from Hamburg in Osnabrueck).

The problem in the Netherlands was also due to frozen switches. They had gas heating, but this broke down. Spokesperson for pro-rail said they could have reliable electric heating switches for 45 million Euros, nationwide, which seems like a no-brainer to me because 3 days of only regional trains is really bad for the image of the railways, even if it only happens once every so many years.

Climate change means more extreme weather, so, you know, it's an adaptation measure.

I still remember the last time snow caused these issues. Only three or four years ago. Then it wasn't due to the quantity, but it being the wrong kind of snow. Too fine, would wear the wheels down too quickly. Better not to run any trains! Saves money.

by nanne (zwaerdenmaecker@gmail.com) on Tue Dec 22nd, 2009 at 03:39:47 PM EST
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The weather is more continental here, so cold snaps aren't that uncommon -- but most trains managed to run in even worse cold snaps here in the past, even though there have always been frozen switches. (My company even has specially built switch 'melters' with aircraft engines.) I don't remember the complete breakdown of entire terminuses.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.
by DoDo on Tue Dec 22nd, 2009 at 03:52:50 PM EST
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