| My travels in the 1980s took me to Sweden on three occasions, and I became very fond of the country, and would love to have the opportunity to go back and explore further.
My travels were confined to the south of the country, based on a triangle formed by Gothenburg in the west, the capital city Stockholm in the east and Helsingborg in the south. I would love to explore the far north, but that is only really practical in the summer and I'm not sure whether I could cope with the mosquitoes at that time of the year. Sweden is a very big but quite sparsely populated country, and the distances travelled by long distance trains are some of the longest in Europe. On the electrified main lines all traffic appeared to be handled by the powerful Rc class of multi-purpose locomotive, but variety in the form of both electric and diesel multiple units were also to be found. Since these images were taken Sweden has caught the privatisation bug. Special mention must be made of the Roslagsbana in Stockholm. In 1983 I knew little about the line, but with a morning free to explore I alighted from the T-Bana at Stockholm East to see what I might find. I was delighted to find a narrow gauge electrified system on which no two trains appeared to be alike. Some trains were loco hauled, others formed of motor cars pulling normal coaches and other trains were made up as genuine multipled units. There were also some marvellous wooden bodied vehicles which must have dated from the earliest days of electrification. This apparently random collection of rolling stock, some of it looking as though it dated back to year 1, was providing an off-peak service of 6 departures an hour to different parts of the network, and appeared to operating perfectly efficiently. SL as the operator appeared to be embarassed by this line as they hardly mentioned it in their presentations to us. I rode on the Roslagsbana partway in 1987 using my complimentary SL pass. To be honest I was pleased to find it was still open, as SL had been threatening to close it for several years. Since then I believe the line has finally been modernised. |
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I spotted this interesting battery loco at the SL depot at AGA on the island of Lidingö, but know little of its origin or date of construction 900x593 SL-Batteryloco_24-8-87.jpg |
This was the sight which greeted the traveller arriving at Stockholm East from the T-Bana nearby. The departure board is a mechanical display showing an intensive service to various destinations. The main line runs to Karsta with short workings while a branch runs east from a junction at Roslags Näsby to the coast at Österskär 900x573 SLJ_Roslagsbana_a_8-10-83.jpg |
The largest single batch of vehicles were a batch of 11 railcars built by ASEA between 1946 and 1949. This set is approaching the city terminus at Stockholm East on 8 October 1983 900x581 SLJ_Roslagsbana_b_8-10-83.jpg |
Some of the newest rolling stock were the X9P multiple units, 4 of which were built with numbers between 57 and 60 in 1962. This set was approaching Stockholm East on 8 October 1983 900x573 SLJ_Roslagsbana_c_8-10-83.jpg |
Roslagsbana services were formed of a combination of genuine electric multiple units, motor railcars pulling conventional trailers, or locomotive hauled trains. This is one of two class BbP locos built by ASEA in 1942 at the head of a train at Stockholm East on 24 August 1987. The lack of fleet number on the end makes exact identification difficult 900x646 SLJ_Roslagsbana_d_24-8-87.jpg |
This railcar is believed to be one of the X3p class with wooden bodies built in 1934. The vehicle was stabled at Lindholmen on 24 August 1987 and may have been employed on works duties 900x647 SLJ_Roslagsbana_e_24-8-87.jpg |
Another view of the X3P class railcar at Lindholmen. This was a quiet and pleasant location typical of much of the area around Stockholm in those days 900x613 SLJ_Roslagsbana_f_24-8-87.jpg |
