The BeerTrain

  The Mariazell Railway is an electrically operated 760mm   ( 2 ft  5  15 ⁄ 16  in )   narrow gauge  line which connects the Lower Austrian  capital of Sankt Pölten   with the Styrian Alpine pilgrimage  centre of Mariazell .  The line was opened in stages between 1898 and 1907, with a now closed branch to Wieselburg an der Erlauf . The railway is currently operated by NÖVOG . Electrification (unprecedented at the time) began in 1911 (using Alternating Current ) as the route & traffic requirements were proving too arduous for the original Steam locos , 16 E series locomotives (still used today as class   1099 ) were delivered between 1909 and 1914. The experience gained from the electrification proved to be the benchmark for later projects of the same kind. The locomotive  design with two separate powered bogies  is widespread today. The route runs from St.Pölten to Ober-Grafendorf , the lines only majo...

I got a call from Stewart Medhurst, out of the blue, that although the narrow gauge line from St.Pölten to Mariazell was currently closed north of Laubenbachmuhle due to a programme of track replacement & complete renewal of the overhead electric equipment (including masts), the Styrian Alpine town of Mariazell was aghast at the prospect of no visitors on their most Sacred of days, Easter Sunday.  Mariazell Basilica, also known as Basilica Maria Geburt (Basilica of the Birth of the Virgin Mary) is the most important pilgrimage destination in Austria and one of the most visited shrines in Europe with about a million visitors each year. It is the only church named as a national shrine of all German-speaking countries. It is also the first destination (accordingly to a plaque I read inside the Basilica) that each newly ordained Pope heads to on a pilgrimage of his own. OBB, who were doing the line up in preparation to offloading it (Novog took it off them) tried to tell the town n...