Back to my Polish travels after a distraction with an eighteenth-century artwork of Norwich and the Norwich Beer Festival. This is Radom’s main railway station (Radom Główny) which opened on 25 January 1885 as part of the railway linking Dęblin, then known as Ivangorod, with Dąbrowa Górnicza. Designed by the Warsaw architect Adolf Schimmelpfennig, the station building originally stood outside the city’s boundaries on land belonging to the village of Prędocinek, with its arrival helping to encourage Radom’s industrial and urban expansion.
The station’s original appearance was rather grander than today, with decoration inspired by Baroque palace architecture, but retreating Russian troops partially burnt the building in July 1915. The Austrian authorities subsequently rebuilt it in a simplified form and it passed into Polish hands in 1918.
Mine was the 09:48 service to Warsaw. I had stayed in Radom partly because I hadn’t been there, but also as Warsaw hotels were expensive. I was also meeting up with the delightful Roy and Jen to welcome them at Warsaw Chopin airport, so I needed an early morning train.
My hotel was a one-minute walk from the railway station, but I left thirty minutes to get there in case of some unexpected delay. I arrived at the railway station 29 minutes earlier than necessary, so I popped into this little cafe.
There was an offer of a latte for the equivalent of £1 and I paid an extra 60p to get a shot of espresso added to it. This is proper continental living. I didn’t bother with breakfast as I felt that the additional espresso had addressed the main nutritional concern.
Safely on the platform.
For reasons I’ve mentioned before numerous times on this riveting blog, I don’t much like reserved seats and that’s particularly true in the UK. There’s usually someone sitting in the seat and I like finding my own seat. However, Polish Intercity train tickets come with a seat reservation and that means there’s a stampede of passengers trying to find their carriage.
I joined the stampede, albeit from the other side of the platform as I don’t want too much frivolity. However, due to my trying to play a game on my phone at the time, I got muddled up and realised I had walked about three carriages too far.
Whilst traipsing through the train back to my seat, I noticed a vending machine which I hadn’t realised they had on board these services. I don’t tend to wander about the train, I should probably explore more.
I knew this in advance, but I had a middle seat in a compartment carriage. I don’t like these compartments which seat six people, but I appreciated that no-one had sat in my seat. I prefer open-plan trains and I think, if my readers will pardon the pun, that this is the general direction of travel when new trains are built. One of the reasons that I don’t like these compartment carriages is that they can promote sociability, which is the last thing that I need on a relaxing rail journey, but more importantly, they can be too hot. Fortunately, neither was a problem on this service which seemed to be just about at capacity.
I was trying to avoid taking photos of people, but this is the corridor section of the train with the compartments leading off it. I hadn’t noticed before that there were fold-down seats here, which were handy for those passengers who wanted to sit down, but inconvenient for anyone wanting to walk down the corridor. Ultimately, it’s thoughtful arrangement which allowed passengers to obstruct the corridor in greater comfort.
My train ticket was to Warszawa Centralna, but the service was delayed by over 45 minutes en route and that would have made it hard to get to the airport to meet Roy and Jen. I noticed that the train stopped at Warszawa Służewiec which is near to the airport and so I got off there. Warszawa Służewiec railway stop first opened in 1962, during the development of the surrounding area as a major industrial district. It was substantially modernised and improved between 2009 and 2012, which is when it took on its new role as a junction between the airport railway and the main line towards Radom.
And the 11:29 service to the airport, so all was well and I arrived to meet Roy and Jen without them having to sit and wait for me.