New Trams Where?

Thanks to the joys of the interwebnet (?) fbb receives summary news items from the Railway Gazette International. Some items remain as a summary, the idea being that fbb will spend his pocket money on a full subscription to the periodical in question. 

He won't! 

But the snippets so promulgated do propel the curious old man into some further research.

The sad fact is that nothing in the above headline meant anything to your usually well educated blogger.

So where IS Elblag (with a curious backwards 'cedilla' on the letter 'a')? It is pronounced "El-blonk" or "El-blong", actually something between the two; the 'cedilla' does that!

That is Poland, in case you did not recognise the outline; and the blue bit at the top is ...

... the Baltic Sea with bits of Denmark and Sweden top left and Germany bottom left. Kaliningrad (centre right) is in Russia. Elblag (next to Kaliningrad) looks as is it isn't quite on the coast. 

That is because it is linked to the Baltic by a canal, broad and strong at the Elblag end ....

... and more canal like inland. 

In his TV series "Pole to Pole", Michael Palin travelled on a chunk of the canal, using a spectacular and fascinating bit of engineering.

But our concern is with the town (city) of Elblag itself. Although badly damaged during WW2, the rebuild has restored much of its glory. 

Here are just a few of its buildings courtesy of Wikipedia.

First we have the waterfront in 1930 ...

... and a similar view today

The spire is of St Nicholas Cathedral (yes, that St Nicholas!) ...

... is a notable landmark.

The building has changed dramatically over the years, ravaged by war and time. Once it looked like this ...

... and what we have today is, mostly, a 20th century rebuild, still distinctive but not quite the same!

The town is famed for its Dutch style apartment blocks ...

... which, although no longer part of the traditional waterfront view are still evident elsewhere.

The railway station looks new with a paved piazza as its introduction ...

... but it is, in fact, the result of a major restoration project, taking the red brick facade ...

... back to something like its original style.

Look at the taxis above, awaiting their wealthy pre WW2 clientele!

But we must get back to its trams - and buses.

The livery is bright and distinctive ...

... applied in various styles over the years.

And you can say the same for the trams ...

... old and newer!

So, tomorrow, fbb will take a closer look at the tram network, historically where possible, then in more detail today. 

At first glance, they do trams somewhat differently in Elblag.

Sadly, the corporate image of yellow and green is occasionally spoiled by all over advertising ...

... but on the positive side, heritage tram(s) do appear on special occasions.

And Talking of St Nicholas ...

... we have no idea what he looked like. But what we do know for absolute certainty is that he had nothing to do with Christmas, presents for children, a red costume and saying "Ho, ho ho!".

The fbbs took lunch at their local garden centre a few days ago and were distressed (but not surprised) to see that Christmas (well, Krissmuss, there is no Christ left) had arrived at the beginning of October.

It used to be that Krissmuss started after Bonfire night, but with the growing opposition to personal fireworks in favour of publicly organised displays,  retailers have replaced Roman candles with Krissmuss Candles starting even earlier!

The display at Sidmouth Garden Centre was as far removed from any sense of spirituality as you could think. Even "Santa" (the very distorted embodiment of a misunderstood St Nicholas) was not in evidence.

But we did have dinosaurs in red hats ...

... some kind of avian invention, also in red hats ...

... plus slimline plastic soldiers ...

... taking seasonal irrelevance to a new nadir!

There were lights a-plenty but ...

..: not even a nominal Bethlehem star apart from a very tiny one atop a plastic tree.

The sooner Christianity divorces itself from this garbage the better; then we can get back to understanding, respecting and rejoicing at the gift of the Saviour of the World, now so often ignored.

Which is more genuine? 

The Christ child is the real bringer of true joy if we only let him in to his own Birthday Party.

fbb will wish his readers a Happy Christmas nearer the due date, but for those who embrace dinosaurs in bobble hats, have a lovely and irrelevant Krissmuss.

  Next Elblag blog : Wed 8th Oct