These pages are for the benefit of anyone
interested in Swiss Narrow Gauge in general; and the Bernina bahn in particular - becaue
the Bernina ia a railway I consider one of the most fascinating in the world. It is,
for so many reasons, my choice as the best of all prototypes for a stunning yet achievable
model railway: |
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It is the highest
of the cross-Alp railways without a summit tunnel, and has always used unique and
very-varied rolling stock;
Trains vary from a single railcar to double-headed expresses, often on the same day;
Tourists have always been the main stay of the line's traffic which, laid over the normal
goods and regional traffic of a single-track branch, makes for busy and fascinating
traffic flows and very modellable trains;
The prototype's use of very small radii (down to 45m!), and steep gradients (up to 1:14 -
and without rack), makes it much easier to fit folded track into smaller spaces;
And of course, probably the major attraction for a model railway: it's Swiss mountain
setting automatically provides lots of "z factor", thus raising the normally
flat board of a model railway in the far more visually dramatic vertical plane. Put
simply, this makes it look a lot more interesting!;
And finally: the Bernina has been continually evolving for over 100 years (it still is),
so there are many fascinating periods to choose from to make models of. What more
could you want? |
In particular, the year
1988 is of interest in that while the then-new ABe 4/4 III railcars had just begun service
that summer, the last of the ABe 4/4 I were still in regular service; and in considerable
variety. What follows therefore deals mainly with my attempts to find out what the
Bernina Bahn was like that year, and how to make a genuinely representative model of this
most dramatic and scenic of Swiss Metre-gauge lines.
indentHowever, while
doing that research, I have found its entire history quite fascinating and hope, over
time, to show how it evolved from little more than a typical Edwardian tramway to an
internationally-famous, World Heritage recongized, main-line railway. |
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