To offer a slightly different nation to the usual US/German/UK trio I offer the Stockholm - Uppsala line, the southerly part of the Ostkustbanan (aka East Coast Line). It's a medium speed commuter line, connecting the capital and the former capital (now the 4th city). A route with multiple train types, route distances and with a detour line via the airport. The route is approximately 50km long (depending which branch). The Route Starting from Uppsala (the Northerly point) is a 10 Track through station, this is the last of the southerly stations for night sleepers and high speed trains to the north of Sweden and the artic circle. After this point trains gain speed through the countryside to the next major station, however in this route we are only going southbound. A modern rebuild of a historic station in the city centre, which is very traditionally European in design. Heading southbound the first stop is Knivsta, a two platform station about 20 mins south of Uppsala. Knivsta is the local council capital, and most trains stop here. The route to the station is across the Upplands plains, a very flat and high speed section of the line. This is now where the railway splits into two sections, the first section on the mainline goes to Marsta and Roserberg, both small commuter towns. Only the "slow" trains stop at either of these stops. The other branch of the line goes to Stockholm Arlanda Airport's underground station. This branch is served by some long haul trains but also by it's own dedicated Arlanda Express. Now having re-emerged into the sunlight the two branches re-merge and carry on south for the medium-fast section of line. At this point it's fairly 50/50 on whether your train is going to blast straight through non-stop or whether you're stopping at every station. This is now the very extremeties of Stockholm, but the scenery is still a mix of country and city. In the following 10 miles you will stop at or pass through, Upplands Väsby - Rotebro - Norrviken - Häggvik - Sollentuna (picture 1) - Helenelund - Ulriksdal and Solna (pic 2) before slowing to a crawl to enter the centre of Stockholm and Stockholm T Centralen station (pic 3/4). Rolling Stock As with many railways there is a real selection of stock used, however I will try to trim it down a bit to the main variants. Long Haul (Stockholm to Luleå and Narvik Night Sleeper) Long haul trains and night sleepers in Sweden are almost entirely loco hauled, often with quite old and interesting stock. This loco type is occasionally used for freight but not so common on this specific line. The most common loco is the SJ RC6: High Speed Medium Distance The X2000 is the workhorse of the high speed network in Sweden, introduced in 1990 and running up to 120mph using it's tilting system to take corners at speed. The X2000 has been used across the world including in China and on the Amtrak line. Local Train On higher speed but not so busy routes the SJ X55 is used, there's not much to write home about with this train. It's your standard commuter / city to country service train. Commuter Train The SJ X40 is the workhorse of the short distance high capacity routes, a fair percentage of the trains between Stockholm and Uppsala are made up of this unit typically running all stops through Marsta. Arlanda Express The Arlanda Express X3 runs a 20 minute service between Arlanda Airport and Stockholm Central. Nothing exciting here, just a to and fro shuttle service! Since DTG only tend to offer up three trains max per DLC i'd go for the RC6, x2000 and X40 services as these are both the most interesting, and varied operationally and stylistically. Plus the scenery is just great.... for what that's worth!
Wow! That’ll be an interesting and quite beautiful route to make, if DTG is stunned by the landscape of course
You see my thinking was most of us are from the usual 3 countries. So surely the only way to be fair is to make something in a totally different country?!? Here's a cab view video from Solna, you can see first bit is slower in the city then the speed cranks up into the country about half way through. Where I go when I'm in Sweden is at about 24 mins in, then you go out onto the plains to one of Swedens most iconic views where Uppsala Cathedral (head of church and former capital cathedral) is visible from 10 miles away.
I recently got back from a trip to Sweden where I took the Stockholm-Narvik sleeper. The Airport station is absolutely stunning, the bare rock at the underground stations really is something special. I'd love to see Stockholm-Uppsala in TSW.
You also have Hagaluns train depot. Northen europe's largest passenger train depot. Which could introduce some shunting senarios. Probably with the Z70. And if we extend the route to Gävle. Then there is a possibility to introduce museum or historic trains. As Sweden's railway museum is located in Gävle. Going from the mueum grounds to Stockholm non stop with an emty train early in the morning and back up stoping at Uppsala on the way. And then back down to Stockholm late in the afternoon and back upto the museum. Might be a fun 4 part senario. However we are going to need few of other routes in Sweden before this happens. But it have to start with that 1 route. Btw here is a more reacent cab ride Stockholm-Uppsala: And one from Gävle-Stockholm:
