Monday 30 November 2015

Turtles Or Tortoises Can Be A Problem,

when they wander on to the tracks,


especially when they get stuck in a part of the switching system,


but luckily for them in Japan this will be a thing of the past, the Suma Aqualife Park is a giant aquarium/beach in Kobe that attracts plenty of tourists and families, most of whom get there by train, however, due to the park’s proximity to the ocean, every year several turtles get stuck in the train tracks and cause delays, malfunctions, or even damage to the trains themselves, so in order to keep both train-riding humans and rail-stuck turtles happy, Japan Railways has implemented this solution, creating escape ditches for the turtles along the rail-road, this new turtle road has been in place since April this year, and from then to August there were 10 turtles observed making use of them to leave the tracks, 10 lives save, 10 potential accidents prevented, I wonder where turtles are causing accidents or delays other railway companies will take Japan's lead?


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

What's become of you model train set-up?

PattayaStan said...

Dear Anonymous, yet another electrical gremlin has hit me, some time ago for the third time the main controller stopped working, the trains are all chipped meaning a special controller is needed, a new one is as I type this £249.00 which at the moment I am reluctant to spend as they seem to have a short life indeed, however when we next return to the UK I will bring it with us to see if it can be repaired, but I fear like the last time it is just one circuit board that needs replacing, the only one in it! so buying a complete new controller is the only option, the good news is that the fun was in building it, but hopefully next year it will be running again, best regards, Stan and Diana.