Homeland Security Act prohibits photography... of trains?

[beet1e]

ROFL. America does seem to be gripped by paranoia these days. I have guys from over there crowing about all the "freedom" they have, which I supposedly do not have living on my tiny little island, and then a thread like this pops up! You can have a gun and shoot stuff, but you can't shoot a train with a camera!

I think ack-ack nailed it - too good to miss.

I'm a bit of a train buff myself. I can take all the pics I want of trains, and can enter railway property to do it. Took this one in Yorkshire just the week before last.



Of course, my TLI isn't paranoid, despite the fact that we got bombed by the IRA for years. Hell, I can even drive a train if I want to. Just to rub it in....  


 

Great thread! Made my freaking day.

[Ack-Ack]

From what a Brit friend tells me, trainspotting is a very popular hobby in the U.K. and Euro.  



ack-ack

[J_A_B]

You have a good eye for pictures Beet1e....or a good camera (perhaps a little of both).    


Any particular story to that 4-6-0, or was it one that was just lucky enough to escape the torch?  

A shortline railroad in my area (Ohio Central RR) bases an operational 4-8-4 and 4-6-2 with a 4-6-0 under repairs and a 2-8-0 undergoing restoration (the connie should be operational next year).  It makes for a lot of photo opportunities--they have great relations with their fanbase, going so far as to give occasional tours of their locomotive shops.  My poor camera skills combined with Ohio's lovely weather (heh) means most of my pictues are rather poor.


Bitish locomotives always have such small tenders.  Was it common British practice to stop at every station even into the '40's and '50's?


J_A_B

[beet1e]

Why, thank you, J_A_B.

The camera I have now is one I bought in August. It has 4 megapixel resolution - much better than what I had before.

Bitish locomotives always have such small tenders. Was it common British practice to stop at every station even into the '40's and '50's?

We had stopping trains as well as express trains. One of our most famous engines was No. 4472, The Flying Scotsman (4-6-2). This locomotive was used to provide a non-stop service between London and Edinburgh (400 miles), and its tender was big enough for all the coal needed. I found a good website about it here. Because of the length of the trip, more than one crew was needed, so the tender had a crew corridor so that crews could be switched between the locomotive and the front carriage of the train.

In America, do you have classifications for diesel locomotives like "Bobo" and "Coco" - and even "Boco"? The train I drove had two carriages, drawn by a Clayton Class 17 locomotive. It had a single cab in the centre, but with two separate driving positions each with its own set of controls, and was a "Bobo". When the loco had a cab at each end, it was known as a "Coco", but I can't remember the exact definitions.

[mora]

I think I'll need to re-install MS Train Sim!:)

[texace]

Originally posted by Mime
dude, just think about it, you're taking pictures of TRAINS...  don't people laugh at you?

Have you any idea...any idea at all how retarded that statement makes you look right now...

[mora]

well, at least he's clearly continuing on the path he has chosen.

[J_A_B]

"In America, do you have classifications for diesel locomotives like "Bobo" and "Coco" - and even "Boco"? "

In US common practice with diesel locomotives is to just refer to them by their maufactuere's designation.  Thus we're left with a confusing jumble of letters and numbers like SD-45, GP-40, C40-8, etc.    I'm more of a steam loco guy myself.  



J_A_B

[Lizking]

S! The Flying Scotsman.  Thanks for that link.  Is it modled in N guage, I wonder.

[beet1e]

In the news just now, I heard that from tomorrow, all visitors to the US must comply with this Homeland Security thing by having machine readable passports. The EU started using these in the early 1990s. I was one of the last people to have the old type.

Government advice here to folks visiting the US: http://www.dhs.gov/us-visit   <- I scanned this site for "trains" but found only advice about not taking explosives aboard trains. Hmmm, I'll remember that for next time.

J_A_B, you should come to the UK, where we have numerous restored steam railways. I could probably come up with a list of about 20. One of my favourites is the Swanage Railway - http://www.swanagerailway.co.uk in southwest England. You can take all the pictures you want, ride on the trains, visit the signal boxes, get a ride on the footplate of a steam loco, and for an affordable price you can even learn about the trains and enjoy a driving experience, along with acting as fireman and "second man" - you get to uncouple the train at the end of the line, change the points to route the engine onto the parallel track and back up to the other end of the train. I've done that and it was hard work lifting those couplings off, and I got covered in grease!

When I first went to the Swanage railway in 2000, I thought the steam locos might be decrepit heaps of clanking old iron. That was not the case at all. The one hauling our train looked and sounded like a well oiled machine.

[Boroda]

Originally posted by Torque
You'd be surprised at the havoc cause by a few derailed tankers full of chlorine, especially in a densely populated residential area, blowing them up it would be ten fold.

In Russia/USSR this is a standard Civilian Defence situation, we have posters of what to do in case of chlorine or ammonia leaks on almost every civilian defence stand.

BTW, here it's officially prohibited to take photos of  railway stations, bridges, tunnels, ports and other strategic transport objects. In Moscow subway you can get fined for taking pictures, and they can make you expose film to the light.

In Soviet times you could get into real trouble if you were caught taking pictures of "strategic objects". It's interesting that when we slowly get rid of paranoia - Americans pick up the flag we dropped ;-)