European Railways


My biggest regret has always been that I didn’t “discover” Europe sooner. I’d never even left the UK shores (if you don’t count Northern Ireland), before 2006, however I’ve now made up for that, on average having two or sometimes three trips to Europe each year. I’m quite lucky in that my shift rota allows me a large amount of free time with which to travel.

A lot of my trips, even cross-border ones are initially based in Germany, either in Berlin or Munich. I can speak a wee bit of German; some “ropey” French and five Czech and four Russian words!! It’s stood me in good stead so far!

From Berlin, it’s possible to have day trips to Poland, the Czech Republic, Denmark and even the Netherlands, while a base in Munich can afford trips to Austria, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Italy and Eastern France (Strasbourg). Admittedly, some of these day trips are major undertakings, lasting anything between twelve and twenty hours, but hey, that’s half the fun. Berlin and Munich can both be reached by EasyJet, from airports which are less than an hours travel from where I live.

When I’m travelling across  Europe, I use an Eurail One Country Pass, if I’m staying within a single country, however, if I’m planning some cross-border international travelling, I’ll use an Eurail Global Pass. There are also some very helpful planning tools on the Internet such as Seat 61 and “The Enthusiasts Guide to Travelling the Railways of Europe”, normally known as EGTRE, which have a wealth of information on European railway travelling. For timetable information, the Deutsche Bahn electronic timetable covers the whole of Europe (including the UK), and is frequently referred to when planning trips.

Why do I like European railways? Probably because they seem to be everything that UK railways aren’t any more. They’re punctual, efficient, frequent, loco-hauled and comfortable.

Check out the drop-down list for information about individual countries. I’ll be adding more when I have a a bit more time, and if I can be of any help to anyone, exploring the railways of Europe for the first time, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

The table below shows the individual European locomotives & multiple units that I have most seen. The last update to this list was: 30-09-2022.

Country CodeClassLoco or Unit NumberTotal Number of Sightings
DEU9999723656
DEU9999724755
DEU9999723455
DEU9999722248
DEU9999724346
DEU9999724041
DEU9999724538
DEU18718701937
DEU9999724134
DEU9999723934
DEU19919986134
DEU9999723233
DEU18718701731
DEU18718701831
DEU9999723530
DEU9999723728
DEU18718701628
DEU19919987425
DEU18918920123
DEU9999590123
DEU48148120123
DEU9999723823
DEU48148130222
DEU48148103321
DEU48148133620
DEU48148122120

The table below shows the top 25 locations visited in Europe listed by the total amount of sightings returned from these locations over the period in which I’ve been logging European railways (currently 07/08/2007-07/03/2020).

On examination of the sightings table, it will be noted that a few locations appear more than once, this is due to the category system used to count particular types of rail-borne vehicles. If the name has no letter in brackets beside it, this indicates main line rail, (S) indicates S-Bahn (Schnellbahn, city trains), (U) indicates underground and (T) indicates trams.

Country CodeLocationTotal All Time Sightings
DNKKobenhavn H1951
DEUOstbahnhof (S) [Berlin]1437
IREDublin Connolly1036
DEUMünchen Hbf1008
NLDAmsterdam Centraal996
DEUBerlin Hbf (S)865
DEUHamburg Hbf837
DEULichtenberg (S) [Berlin]568
NLDAmersfoort505
CZEPraha hl.n.499
AUTInnsbruck Hbf443
BELBruxelles Midi435
DEUBerlin-Ostbahnhof408
DEUWernigerode (HSB)350
CHEZurich HB345
DEUAlexanderplatz (S) [Berlin]326
DEUBerlin-Lichtenberg316
DEUBerlin Hbf293
DEUSchönefeld (S) [Berlin]286
DEUBerlin Flughafen Schönefeld286
DEUBornholmer Straße (S) [Berlin]281
DNKFredericia255
POLSzczecin Port Centralny243
DEUAlexanderplatz (T) [Berlin)218
IREDublin Hueston216