Keeping the trains running

A flat country with snowy winters is a recipe for transport chaos. Snow in fields adjoining railway lines can drift across the tracks, halting trains. An effective old-tech solution is to make simple wooden screens, strategically deposit them at trackside locations, and when snow is forecast, erect them alongside the railway so that the snow piles up there rather than on the line itself. Year in, year out these screens serve their purpose and somehow they have not as yet ended up as firewood. There are two stretches of track between W-wa Dawidy and W-wa Jeziorki that are particularly prone to drifting.

Above: A southbound EN57 elektryczka on its way to Radom from Warsaw. Below: A row of screens protects the main Warsaw - Katowice/Kraków railway line from drifts.