Above: Only the woman with the mobile phone gives away the scene's date to post-communist times. This station is absolutely dreadful, avoid travelling from it or changing trains here at all costs. Unless you are fascinated by Poland in the communist era. Come here for a taste of what the Old System was like. Polish national railway museum? Here it is! One early '80s vintage railway station, in working condition (just), preserved in aspic.To find out when your train is coming, you need to descend into the single tunnel linking all seven platforms. There, in the gloom, you will find (separate) timetables for PKP, SKM, WKD and KM trains. In tiny weeny writing; I need to take my reading glasses out to discover when (and from which platform) my train is. And then check that there isn't a supplementary timetable, somewhere else along the dark tunnel, which tells you that the main timetable has actually been replaced by this one.
Platform numeration at W-wa Zachodnia:
Platform (Peron) 1 (WKD)Track (Tor) 1, track 2
Platform 2
Track 20, track 22 (with me so far?)
Platform 3
Track 23, track 21
Platform 4
Track 8, track 25 (this is where it gets complicated)
Platform 5
Track 4, track 6
Platform 6
Track 1, track 2 (OK...?)
Platform 7
Track 5, track 3 (Logical?)
Platform 9¾ can't be far away. The true anorak might make sense of PKP's passenger-hostile track numeration system, but for the average traveller, this is hell. The number of times I've been caught out, having to dive into the tunnel to find out from which platform and at which time my train is due, only to find it's come and gone - it fills me with fury at the sheer unreformability of this particular station. Today I had to change here for Jeziorki and found myself sitting by an elderly couple who'd boarded this Radom-bound train thinking it will get them to Kielce. Their journey home will be interesting.
Down in the tunnel that links tracks 1, 2, 20, 22, 23, 21, 8, 25, 4, 6, 1, 2, 5 and 3 (in that order), you will be able to find stalls selling months-old magazines that have come off sale-or-return, and made their way via unofficial channels to a secondary market, where they are sold for a fraction of their cover price. Another reason why publishing is a particularly unrewarding business in Poland (state TV dumping airtime prices being the other one). Down here you'll also find down here real hardcore żul hangouts, like Bar na Luzie, where beer is still 3 zlotys a half-litre. The stench of burnt casseine, onions and kebab fat mingle with those of the unwashed.
And this train is for...? To be honest, I never did find out. It pulled in unannounced, no timetable on platform, it pulled out. Not Jeziorki-bound, anyway.
As it happened, today was an unusual day. Thieves stole overhead power lines on the Radom line between Warka and Radom. This happens from time to time (like when Eddie and I were headed for the Bieszczady with our bikes on holiday a few years back).
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9 comments:
What about Kutno's railway station at 2:30 AM?
Try to survive
Gdy sie pozna sposób oznaczania torów na kolei to sie okaże, że to ma jakiś sens. Otóż:
1. Linia WKD jest zupełnie niezależna od reszty układu torowego
2. Tory numer 1 i 2 są (chyba) zawsze torami głównymi, i tak: z jednej strony stacji są wtedy kolejne numery parzyste, z drugiej kolejne nieparzyste, oraz gdy na stacji jest dużo torów to stosuje się osobne oznaczenia dla grupy torów poprzedzone w tym przypadku cyfrą 2 (stąd tory 20, 21, 22, 23).
Czasem można spotkać wyjątki od tych reguł tak jest na przykład na stacji Wrocław Główny.
Kutno to faktycznie dziura jakich mało, zwłaszcza dworzec nocą. Absolutnie nie polecam.
Warszawa Wschodnia również wygląda uroczo, zwłaszcza te "poczekalnie" na peronie, gdzie wyleguje się ciekawy element.
Tak czy owak, krzyż wszystkim próbującym czegoś się dowiedzieć obcokrajowcom na drogę (zwłaszcza jeśli nie znają w ogóle polskiego).
Taka numeracja jest stosowana na każdej innej stacji i jest logiczna, ale dla kolejarza, a nie dla pasażera. Dla pasażera numery torów powinno się podawać w niezależnym systemie numeracji, licząc co 1 od budynku stacyjnego (i tak się zresztą robi na wielu stacjach).
UNBE-f**king-LEIVABLE!
As always with PKP, the customers come last and are treated as a sort of nuisance or pest that gets in the way of the smooth operation of someone's private train set.
Why-oh-why-oh-why do Polish stations not number their platforms in a simple logical way? None of this perony/tor crap, just number the track closest to the main station entrance as 1, and continue in integer intervals. You could even call them 'perony' (and do away with that horrible word 'tor'). What could be simpler? It seems to work in the rest of the civilised world. Why not in Poland? (Hmmm, the implication here is that Poland is part of the civilised world: I sometimes wonder...)
And by the way, REDAK, I don't care how you try to justify the illogicality of it, it's an utterly SHITE system and needs to be changed. NO EXCUSES!
Perhaps 'museum' is that correct term for the PKP system.
(BTW, just read Pawel's comment, and I see he agrees – quite independently – with my idea on platform numbering. I agree entirely: railways should be designed for passengers, not for the convenience of railway workers.)
Oh, and while we're at it, what's it with adding the word 'rok' in Polish (or the abbreviation 'r.') to every date, what an utter waste of time! This is the 21st century for Pete's sake (whoever Pete was), not the 16th, though I sometimes wonder when I'm in Poland.
My complaint about Polish stations, and stations in a number of CEE countires, is the lack of station name boards. Usually there are just one or two boards on the station buiding, especially smaller country stations. Nothing else. No idication of where you are, no simple joys for the foreigner as they try to pronoune the name. Compare with German or British stations, where every lamppost has a station name sign Same on the metro in cities such as Prague, Moscow etc. Why no name sign? A voice announcement is just not enogh.
Not so long ago (some months), you could even see rats wandering around some unidentifiable garbage dump, just behind the fence at WKD track 1. Luckily, they cleaned up the place a little, so the rats are no more. :-)
Even Romanian Railways can number platforms from 1 to whatever number is needed in sequential order. (OK, Oradea is an exception, they forgot a platform hence there is a number 0 there too.) I remember some Poles telling me in 1990 that "Romania is like our country was in 1945. Perhaps PKP can take note? "More screwed up than even a corrupt, post-Ottoman state like Romania" is pretty damning really.
Hi Michael - Bob here - amazing post! What is the answer, what would be the cost to bring at least the basics up to standard and when do we start the project? (with our fee included of course!)
Off to the US in the morning for a month - drop me an email when you have time.
Bob
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