Dedicated to Chris Edmonds, aka , who probably has the largest, most well organized, and maybe even most interesting collection of railroad shots. Every one of his photos seems to be a real gem, along with often detailed descriptions on the whereabouts and the history of the rolling stock in question. As a typical European, I used to think of American railroading as the absolutely intimidating steamers of the past, and the similarly large but rather uninteresting diesels that are a common sight nowadays. His shots showed me that there is much more to it, a lot of history behind it, and much more to discover about how rail travel developed in the US when compared to Europe.

I wanted to partly copy one of his shots, and almost managed to catch a class 110 at the same place as this one, but the emphasis lies on "almost". However, he also submitted this photo, taken inside Cologne central station in 1973, so I opted for a shot from the very same platform, but from a greater distance, to catch more of the magnificent architecture.

For the railfans: To the very left, outside the main building, we've got a double decker commuter, followed by a Bombardier Talent (two unit train), and ICE of the third generation, another double decker, an IC with no cab car at the end, and to the far right, a class 425 EMU.