The new PURPLE 'tram' line in Jerusalem.
Testing has begun on the northern extension with construction essentially complete. Safety issues are expercted to delay both northern and southern openings until Passover 2025. Zev Rothkopf's picture is at the B'nai Yaakov northern terminal.
A correction has been made to the previous posting. The two middle trucks are both under the center body section, not underr the joints. This means that the inner ends of the outer body sections are suspended from the middle section.
1, Patronage on both Egged buses and the Light Rail is up, but not all the way to pre-7 Oct. levels.
2, On one occasion when sirens were heard, our teacher asked all four of us students to move to what is considered the safe area of the building, a stairway without windows surrounded by stone walls. Nothing happened, and we returned to the study room (Beit HaMidrash).
3. The November issue the Light Railway Transit Association (I just might be their oldest member and have been one for about 71 or 72 years, www lrta.org), Trams & Urban Transit, has some details on the 132 new light rail cars that will serve the new Blue Line that will bring light rail service to the Hebrew University, Givat Saphadit/French Hill, the Malcha area, and the original Jerusalem Railway Station, now a cultural center with a theatre adjacent. A logical externsion from its Malcha southern terminal would be as an interurban over the original Jerusalem railway line, being maintained but not in service, to Beit Shemesh,
The new 132 cars will built by PESA in Poland. For comparison, the operating Red Line originally operated by Citypass and now by Caphir, has 48 cars of similar length, and pre-7 Oct. carried 140,000 passenger journeys each weekday.
The 48 Alstom Civitas cars are all double-ended, with drivers cabs at both ends. But except for preliminary initial testing, they operate only in 2-car trains. This means that there is both unnecessay equioment and space wasted. They have 12 wheels, all powered, with three body sections having the trucks\bogies (4-wheels) below (low floors possible because the wheels protrude into the spaces under the back-back seats), and two additional body sections are suspended between the sections with trucks/bogies.
The PESA cars will slso be low-floor, but with 16 wheels, four trucks, and three body sections. Two trucks/bogies will be under the body section at the front and rear and two under the middle section. They are single-ended, and so should have greater capacity than the Red Line cars, and will operate back-to-back.
Used the light rail twice today, and headways and operation were noirmal. But patronage about 1/3 normal for times of day.
The Arab buses appeared normal with normal patronage.
Egged seemed to provide half the service, with headways doubled. The Superbus line that overlaps Egged seemed be entirely out. Jerusalem local, no experience recently with intercity. On one mid-day Egged bus, I was the only passenger.
And as I starterd to post, I heard air-raid sirens for the first time, and then several booms. Local defenses must have brought down the missels. The particular Yeshiva building where I am tyoing is of stone with a wood-and-heavy-shingles roof. No specific shelter is nearby, and so I just continued posting when I heard the sirens,
I also checked the Hebrew and English Light Rail websites and found nothing related to the war effort.
I believe the service is regular, but with longer headways, because of fewer operators available.
I appreciate Gramp's wishes for my safety (Cox Birney thread), and believe a reply is appropriate,
I did check the English Language Israel Railways website. I'm sure services are curtailed, if only because of many reservists being called to active duty, Also Ashdot and Ashgkelon are fairly close to where fighting was taking place. But there was no evidence of this on the website. Probably because the one who posts the notices is also on active duty.
If any missiles were fired at Jerusalem, they must have been caught bythe Iron Dome early-on, because there have been no air-raid alarms.I did not know of this war and horrible Israeli casualty numbers whenI woke-up this morning. I knew something was up when most of theyoungsters were missing at services this morning. They are all at thefront or otherwise occupied in the war effort.Indeed, I had planned to go home after the close of Shabbat, combinedwith the one-day holiday in Israel, by a frequently used route: Arab255 or 275 bus from the back door to Damascus Gate, then Light Rail toAmuniti8on Hill, then Egged 34 or 52 bus to my apartment. I waited ahalf-hour, and no bus in either direction came. A Taxi stopped topick me up, but when I entered I saw there were two other passengers,an Arab woman and an Arab man. The driver was Arab but did speakHebrew when asking for my destination. I got quite a tour ofJerusalem's Mt. of Olives neighborhoods before heading in thedirection of my apartment. And I went to bed with a war the lastpossible thought on my mind.
From Steve Sattler, trabnslated from Globus
The previous post really belongs on bthe Tel Aviv Metro thread. And we will use the direct connection at the Tel Aviv Arlozoroff Station, not requiring the bus between Israel Railways and the Red Light Rail Line.
But this post is prompted by a more serious matter. The Amunition Hill, Givat HaTachmoshet Station is the one closest to my Ma'alot Daphna Apartment, and I use it regularly, with a five-minute walk or two three-or-four-stop bus connections to my apartment, and two bus lines to the University. (Both the University and Ma'alot Daphne will have light-rail stations when current construction is completed. The following is from today's on-line Jerusalem Post:
An attempted stabbing attack was thwarted at a light rail station near Ammunition Hill in Jerusalem on Sunday evening, with the woman suspected of attempting to carry out the attack reportedly shot at the scene, according to initial reports.
Israel Police chief Kobi Shabtai arrived at the scene shortly after the incident.
The security guard who spotted the terrorist told Shabtai that he saw the woman going in and out of the light rail and asked her if she needed help. The woman then reached into her bag and pulled out a knife. The guard then jumped backward and shot twice in the air and ordered the woman to drop the knife. She refused to and the guard shot her in the leg, lightly injuring her.
The terrorist was identified by Palestinian media as Samira Harbawi. Her children were reportedly arrested shortly after the attack in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
Harbawi was reportedly arrested two months ago at the same light rail stop where she attempted the attack, but was judged to be unfit to stand trial by a court.
Take a ride on our light rail line:
https://youtu.be/_gHQ_HzUDd4
News from yesterday,
The Jerusalem City Planning unit of the Municipality has started
their project to build a METRO in Jerusalem. The planning has begun.
Unsure about visitors but think not, since the various monthly passes are available only for citizens and registered forreign students. Corection: 75-and-over. 65 - 74 continue with half-fare. Half-fare also applies to registered students, including foreign students (who must also sign-up for sick-fund insurance and then receive treatment when required.) That being the case, I believe a visitor 75-and-over, who is a student at a University or Yeshiva, could get the free-transportation card. 65-74 half-fare, including an appropriate monthly pass.
Free fares over 65 but not visitors?
Dave:
Was that the cap I sent you several years ago? It looks nice on you.
Ed Burns
Today, the first of August, was a big day for me and other senior citizens who use public transportation, effective today, free thoughout Israel for citizens over 65, and I'm 90. The same plastic card is used, and converted electronically for me at the Central Bus Station.
This map is not-to-scale, and some relative distances are very distorted:
Lines currently under costruction bor in detailed engineering all pass through or touch the main central business sdistrict. Now an exception has been authorized, the Puplee Line.
I'm posting this photo again, because the chartered bus sogn on the negative was badly deteriorated, and in the coirrecton on the first posting, I misread the sign on another posted image, and need to post the correction. I will also replace the original posted image:
I owe Bradley Clarke's book Boston's MTA, Boston Street Railway Association, publishers for the correction.
It's really an electronic piano, with much the same technology as a synthesizer keyboard. A think the best answer to your question is "a good wide-range lousdspeaker."
What does a concrete piano use for a sounding board?
One Dave Klepper, age 17+, wearing his ROTC uniform, Oct. or Nov. 1949 in front of MIT on Massachusetts Avenue, with a Type-4 enrout from Memorial Drive to Watertown, via Central Square, between. The Vassar Street on the roll-sign is there because the operator could not find a Mrmorial Drive sign and picked the sign for the closest point he could find, and then did not change it for the return trip to Watertown:
Dave Klepper, age 88+, 2020, playing HaTikvah on the Jerusalem City Hall concrete piano, with an Alstom Citidas 302 light-rail train as background, Jack May photo with unknown lady-in-red:
71 years separate the photographs, but 100 years the rail-cars, 1912-1913 and 2012-2013. NP-Eddie, note the head covering!
With new management, this old symbol for Citipass:
Has been replaced by:
With the Hebrew word Kafir; translation is "young lion/"
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