#DavidTrainMic

At close to 800 km today, the Beijing Subway looks to be a very well-connected colossal urban rail network — yet did you know that as early as a few years back, there were lines physically separated from the rest of the network?...

In late 2021, the Swiss railways discontinued the miniature pocket timetables for intercity travel. It's understandable — in this day and age of the smartphone, paper timetables are in less demand — but they also killed a classic of the rails in Switzerland. David Feng goes through one (from 2018) — still a simplistic, informative design classic...

It's the only country/territory I've been to so far where I've done rail mileage without starting a journey from there. It's an independent country which uses Swiss currency and Austrian rail services. And it's often misspelt and misunderstood. Welcome to Liechtenstein — train edition!

The latest trend on railway Twitter seems to be doing maps of all the railway routes you've taken. For someone who's done half a million kilometres across 17 countries and territories, this was the perfect chance to 'show off' all my miles!... including a rather suspicious travel record for Liechtenstein...

For the longest time, Beijing was missing a Subway Line 3. It's finally coming next year (2023); but did you know it had very ambitious plans? Summer Palace... Central Beijing... Workers Stadium for Sanlitun... Wangjing and the airport?... Part of this is still coming; quite a lot of the route, in the meantime, has been replaced by other lines taking (part) of its track...

Train announcement 2 - With queues at Chinese stations sometimes surreally long, expats and visitors used to feel limited — as ticket machines and online ticketing were mostly for locals. Now, no longer, as an English-language, foreigner-friendly ecosystem is increasingly reality for rail travellers in China.

Train announcement 1 - Did you know that there are a number of railway stations on German soil managed by the Swiss, and vice versa? There are two Swiss stations in Germany, and a fair bit more German stations in far northern Switzerland.