Spaghetti Tracks

Cologne has more than one bridge over the Rhine. This one is mainly a road bridge, but also has a railroad line of sorts going over it.

The Cologne "Stadtbahn" system is hard to qualify. Is it a subway? Partly yes, but then there are many overground parts with horribly tight curves, such as this one. Parts have low platforms, parts have high platforms. Parts go straight on the street, while others go over normal railroad tracks which are electrified with 600 V DC. Parts of the high platform system still have low platforms, and parts of the low platform system still have high platforms. It's a right mess.

The line here belongs to the low-platform part of the system, and is used with low-floor cars like the K4000, shown here. The K4000 is also very similar to the ones used in Croydon, South London, according to . While it looks like a streetcar, it's also a fully qualified mainline railroad vehicle, although it needs the rather rare combination of mainline tracks and streetcar electricity to show that.

The curves and electrification makes this track triangle (one leg cannot be seen because I'm standing on these tracks) look extremely complicated.