North Entrance

I miss North-Rhine Westphalia. Well, not all of it. I couldn't care less about Westphalia one way or another, and I'm not overly fond of the northern parts of the north rhine area… but I do love Cologne and Aachen. Staying in Bavaria now is nice, but Regensburg has nowhere near the amount of life that Aachen does, and while Nuremberg and Munich are fine, both are a notable distance away by train (and neither is fun to travel to by car). Last week, I was back there for a few days, to help my sister move - which was not fun in the weather, but what can you do.

Here, the north-eastern entrance of Cologne's central station, the Breslauer Platz. Of the two sides of the station, this one, pointed away from the historic city center, has always been the less interesting, more seedy one. With the opening of the new subway station a few years ago, and the associated renovations of the plaza, this has improved, but it's still not the point for the rich tourists.

This side is also the site of the last addition to the central station, with the S-Bahn commuter rail platform, where a class 423 train is currently pulling in. Together with the roof extension here and the historic cathedral in the background, it can make for a nice picture.

There are currently plans to change this area again, by adding two more S-Bahn tracks in front. These would then take over services that are currently run as RB lines, freeing up the conventional tracks for medium- and long-distance trains. This will also see a new addition to the famous Hohenzollernbrücke, but keeping in the old style, so the only difference will be that it will be wider. Basically everybody agrees that this is very useful idea, so it will be implemented as soon as money is there. Meaning: Don't expect it to open for the next twenty years at least. In fact, this may be overly optimistic.