At the "Nord"!
Ferrovie Nord Milano. A private railway, a world apart! It was in 1991/92 i knew them very well, after few trips made when i was a baby - with my dad - while first discovering the sensation of the travelling by train. In 1990 i did a fast visit to the station in P.zza Cadorna / Milan and it let me again impressed: between waves of people coming and going from stairs and platforms, continuosly were appearing those classics brown trains that made the emblem of the FNM. Among buzzes of old compressors, slamming doors and whistles - of diverse tonality from the FS ones - you could breathe that characteristic smell of oil and trains disappeared by so many time. Those old iron rusty shelters under which so many generations of pendular workers have waited their trains. The beautifull arched shed above the left tracks - coming from the missed old market of Varese - was already gone and first signs of the future were invading this corner of old milanese reality. Works and excavations to build the new station were started, a new station more modern and rational but surely less interesting and historic of this one! And then i understood! How much time was remainig to me to get all that with my camera? After short time i was ready to organize some visits to the Nord. In the 1991 i started to work as an employee and i had to organize my time: until 5.00 pm i was in the office, from 5,30 until 7.00pm i was in Cadorna! And so i did: i went there at least 15 times, even in the morning, before 8,30am. I fixed on slides and prints those trains and shuntings, more and more times. Seeing coming slowly from the ramp of Bullona and on those old switches an EB with all that rake of coaches or the M.U. of eight pieces, while a shunter DE.500 was ready to take apart some coach added as rush hour helps, was a true spectacle. In the morning two hauled trains were arriving around 8.00am from Varese and Como with E.600 or E.610 and traditional coaches. I learnt to check what kind of loco was in charge of the second one, because it would have done the freight service Seveso - Camnago FS that day. I hoped to catch the beautifull eight all brown pieces M.U. coming from Laveno at 7.30am. In the noon the show was made by hauled trains ready to take passengers back to their homes in the hinterland on the rush hour: four trains were ready with E.600, 610 or 620 and old wood seated coaches, while on first tracks every day M.U. of EB and EBD leaves the station for Novara and Asso. And all was controlled by the old wood tower down there, in the middle of rails, wires and switches. Then the future came and raised it down to make place fo a modern ACEI cabin with air condition and all comforts. "This coach doesn't leave" were telling labels standing hanging on coaches parked on rails waiting their rush hour work; a detail like others gone with increasing blocked-compositions and minimal shunting moves. Progress took us Malpensa Express, clean high platforms and metals on elastic bases. But is to erasing the last bastion of old FNM: Bullona station. Works for improve the service always increasing will do their victim in some years, but by then i hope i will be able to get some images to stop the time on the FNM.