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Saturday, 18 June 2022

Warka Miasto

Opened three months ago, the completely new station serving Warka (rather than its north-western outskirts) is an entirely welcome development. Warka Miasto station lies a whole kilometre closer to the centre of town than Warka station (opened 1934). I decide to go into Warka from Chynów by train to give the new station a go. 

Below: the journey there was on the oldest rolling stock that Koleje Mazowieckie could muster - a ripple-sided, three-windscreen EN57; here it is pulling into Chynów, it dates from 1973; it's 49 years old. Heritage railways in the UK have newer attractions. [This was to be my last ever photo and ride on an unmodernised EN57 on the Radom line.]

It arrived in Chynów just four minutes late (not bad since it set off from Pilawa 97km away, stopping at every Warsaw station en route). These old trains are unreliable and lack modern facilities, but they do have one huge plus in summer - you can open the windows. And that allows me to take photos like the one below - as my train pulls out of Krężel station (staggered platforms), a modernised EN57 awaits the signal to depart for Chynów and then on to Warsaw. Note the lowered pedestrian level-crossing barrier.

Below: arrival, Warka Miasto. My first time on this platform. At the end, the new viaduct carrying ulica Lotników over the line (the bridge replacing a level crossing). Beyond, just about visible (click to enlarge) the pair of new bridges carrying the railway over the river Pilica. A reminder that until the modernisation of the Warsaw-Radom line, it was single track south of Warka, including just the one bridge over the Pilica. More on this here.


Below: remember, this is a new-build, not a refurbished station; everything is as it should be - shelters, signage, level access with lifts up to street level. Lifts have a habit of breaking down and attract vandals, which is why I prefer gently sloping ramps (like the ones accessing the foot tunnel at Chynów station). I guess these lifts were installed because of a lack of alternative (private land on either side), and that the cost of installation was one of the most expensive parts of the whole investment at Warka Miasto.


Below: from the top of the viaduct, looking down ul. Lotników towards the centre of Warka, which lies behind the block of flats in the middle of this picture. A nine-minute walk from the station, rather than the 20 minutes or so marching along the main road into town.


Below: on the roundabout as you come into Warka from the north, the Lim-2 (Polish licence-built MiG 15) on a pedestal, looking like it will be devoured by plant life soon.


Below: it looked a lot tidier back in 2015 when I took this photo.


I took the opportunity to walk around Warka's periphery (building-material and agrochemical wholesalers, sand-, gravel- and coal merchants, car washes, what have you) and took the train back to Chynów from Warka rather than Warka Miasto. In contrast to the train out, the return journey was on the latest rolling stock; this is the Newag Impuls - which arrived from Radom 25 minutes late. For a 15km journey that takes all of 12 minutes. 

I suspect the delay was a knock-on effect caused by the late running of the Sienkiewicz, the Kraków-Olsztyn express, which was running 50 minutes behind schedule. The local train would have had to be held at Dobieszyn (two stations south of Warka Miasto) to allow the express through. Below: here indeed is the Sienkiewicz, pulling into Warka. From here, next stop Piaseczno (23 minutes), then four Warsaw stations, then a further eight stations to Olsztyn (over three and half hours away). I quite fancy the idea of taking a short hop from Warka to Piaseczno and having a craft beer in the bar towards the middle of the train, watching the orchards fly past.


This time last year:
Elegy for a lost exurbia

This time two years ago:
Farewell to Papuś

This three years ago:

This time four years ago
Seven Brief Lessons on Physics reviewed

This time five years ago:
Now it belongs to the ages - on Great Works of Art

This time six years ago:
More Brictorian Liverpool

This time seven years ago:
Łódź - city of tenements

This time eight years ago:
Liverpool reborn

This time nine years ago:
What goes round comes around: retro is cool - again.

This time ten years ago:
Warsaw's southern bypass by this time next year?

This time 11 years ago:
Stand Easy! - a short story

This time 14 years ago:
God Save The Queen - I mean it, Ma'am

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2 comments:

  1. whitehorsepilgrim19 June 2022 at 19:42

    I remember travelling on an EN57 on a very hot day back in the late 1980s with some of the doors open! Probably not allowed now.

    The ramps installed in the UK to meet design standards for wheelchairs are long and expensive, and take a lot of land. But they don't break down, get vandalized beyond spray paint, or get used as urinals. Also they don't require a heavy power supply (a costly issue at some stations), and there is no hydraulic fluid to freeze in winter.

    Getting hold of land rather depends upon the compulsory purchase mechanisms available, as well as what negotiation can yield. (I recall a bridge scheme in the UK faltering because the landowner, who was the local MP, demanded ten times the commercial value of the land. In a quite different case - Gomshall station - the adjoining landowner donated the land for the ramped bridge in memory of an family member who was a holocaust survivor.)

    In general, getting hold of land adjoining the railway is a complex issue, and it's one that has kept my colleagues and I busy many a time.

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  2. Michael Dembinski19 June 2022 at 23:41

    @WHP

    The practice of EN57s running with open doors ended around ten years ago; even the oldest stock (like the one pictured) has had some rudimentary modernisation which includes some form of mechanism ensuring the doors cannot be opened while the train is moving.

    Interesting point about land for access!

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