With my daughter Alex starting a new school this year a review was needed in the area of transportation.
The options where reasonably simple: catch the bus, catch the train or the least reliable of them all – catch a ride with dad. The bus was ruled out almost immediately as that would require more than one and catching a ride with dad was less than optimal, due to the time we would have to rise in the morning in order to make the trip time less than an hour due to rush hour traffic. It was agreed then that the train was in fact the best option.
Admission time –
I had, until this time, never ridden on a train.
Worked on them – yes, traveled as a passenger - no.
Why, well to be honest, it has always seemed fundamentally wrong to me that an object weighing several hundred ton and packed with human lives is propelled down a steel track at pace and the “driver” doesn’t have a steering wheel! I know, I know naïve and foolish but it just never seemed right.
I feel like a bit of a baby now having said that.
Anyway, we made our way to the train station in Henderson where I was to discover the first surprise of the day, trains come every fifteen min’s – what! Not randomly and unpredictably with timetables that change daily and without notice like the bus, but every fifteen min’s, I’m impressed. Further to that, the train we are wanting to catch is early, yes that’s right early and unlike the bus has not simply carried on to the next stop so the smirking driver can ignore the people running desperately towards the stop, no it is stopped and waiting. We board to find the coaches well lit, tidy and air conditioned; this only seems to be getting better!
There’s a strange feeling of superiority attached to riding a train I discovered. It comes from watching everything from pedestrians to Kenworth trucks stopping and waiting as you sail serenely past at a level crossing.
Lovely
So twenty five minutes later we rock our way into Baldwin Ave stop, some, oh I don’t know, twenty five minutes faster than I could have managed it in the car!
Suffice to say; I am now a huge train convert, not only is the train prompt, predictable and reliable, it’s cheap! It costs me twenty dollars a week to send my daughter to school and wouldn’t you know it there’s a train station at the bottom of the street my work is situated on.
All I can say is if you haven’t taken a train ride lately through your local area try it, you may be as pleasantly surprised as me.
Daryl W.
19/03/2008
The options where reasonably simple: catch the bus, catch the train or the least reliable of them all – catch a ride with dad. The bus was ruled out almost immediately as that would require more than one and catching a ride with dad was less than optimal, due to the time we would have to rise in the morning in order to make the trip time less than an hour due to rush hour traffic. It was agreed then that the train was in fact the best option.
Admission time –
I had, until this time, never ridden on a train.
Worked on them – yes, traveled as a passenger - no.
Why, well to be honest, it has always seemed fundamentally wrong to me that an object weighing several hundred ton and packed with human lives is propelled down a steel track at pace and the “driver” doesn’t have a steering wheel! I know, I know naïve and foolish but it just never seemed right.
I feel like a bit of a baby now having said that.
Anyway, we made our way to the train station in Henderson where I was to discover the first surprise of the day, trains come every fifteen min’s – what! Not randomly and unpredictably with timetables that change daily and without notice like the bus, but every fifteen min’s, I’m impressed. Further to that, the train we are wanting to catch is early, yes that’s right early and unlike the bus has not simply carried on to the next stop so the smirking driver can ignore the people running desperately towards the stop, no it is stopped and waiting. We board to find the coaches well lit, tidy and air conditioned; this only seems to be getting better!
There’s a strange feeling of superiority attached to riding a train I discovered. It comes from watching everything from pedestrians to Kenworth trucks stopping and waiting as you sail serenely past at a level crossing.
Lovely
So twenty five minutes later we rock our way into Baldwin Ave stop, some, oh I don’t know, twenty five minutes faster than I could have managed it in the car!
Suffice to say; I am now a huge train convert, not only is the train prompt, predictable and reliable, it’s cheap! It costs me twenty dollars a week to send my daughter to school and wouldn’t you know it there’s a train station at the bottom of the street my work is situated on.
All I can say is if you haven’t taken a train ride lately through your local area try it, you may be as pleasantly surprised as me.
Daryl W.
19/03/2008
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