Mopping Up

 I've been on holiday.

Don't panic; this isn't the beginning of an eighteen part series on the underground stations of Buenos Aires.  (Although if anyone would like to give me the money to go to Argentina to write an eighteen part series on Buenos Aires, feel free.  I've been watching Celebrity Race Across The World and Argentina looks amazing).  No, this was a holiday with the BF in France, and it mostly involved doing this:

However, the trip to Nice meant I didn't finish the Sweden trip write up. Oh yes, there's more!  Try to conceal your excitement.  On my last day in Stockholm, my flight back to Manchester wasn't until the evening, so obviously I had to lark about on the railways for a bit until it was time to go home.  I'll try and keep this brief.

The Roslagsbanan: Stockholms Östra to Vallentuna

Stockholms Östra is the terminus of the Roslagsbanan, the light railway that goes through the north-east of the city region and which I previously yammered on about in the post about Universitetet.  One look at the station and you know that this is the unwanted child of the SL network; it's been done up recently, apparently, but it was still basically a few platforms behind a building with very little in the way of facilities or excitement.  (I will emphasise I was there on a Sunday morning, so maybe it's a throbbing hotspot on a Monday).

With it being the weekend, I expected it to be relatively peaceful there, but actually the station was abuzz with Gentlemen Of A Certain Type.  I'd followed two of them out of the Tengiska högskolan tunnelbana station, a pair of excitable teen boys who were definitely not the type to smoke fags and drink Mad Dog 20/20 on their lunch hour.  They had backpacks and big headphones and were chatting away to one another, almost over one another, and I recognised them as Railway Fans.

It seemed I'd arrived at Östra on a day when there was going to be heritage trains running, and an unfair part of me would say, "how can they tell?"  That rickety thing on the platform above is the normal engine for the service and it looks like it should be carrying a worried defector to the Russian border in a Cold War drama.  

In fairness, when my train turned up, it was a much newer model, with decent suspension and a less rickety air.  It was soundly ignored by the Men Who Like Trains, who were dashing down the platform in search of more niche thrills.  Good luck to you, fellas.

I took the train to Vallentuna, towards the top of the Karsta line (number 27).  Why did I pick this particular spot?  It was as good as any, I suppose.  It was a small suburb.  It had a bus that would take me away from the Roslagsbanan to my next station.  Why not?

Actually the main reason I went there was so I could make this joke on Twitter.

One like.  You people don't deserve me.

A brief turn around the block revealed a small pedestrianised shopping centre with a Coop and a library, a fire station, and some teenagers being dead excitable as they headed into town for hi-jinks.  Meanwhile, I waited at a bus stop for my ride.

Upplands Väsby

This is a commuter station and is in an area that felt distinctly down at heel.  I'm probably going to get a bunch of comments from irate Swedes telling me that this is in fact Stockholm's version of Hampstead but the buildings we passed on the bus looked tired and unedifying, and the people waiting with me on the platform had a vaguely grimy air to them.

The Pendeltåg is the heavy rail network around the city, the one that descends into a tunnel to go to Stockholm City and out the other side.  It was particularly well patronised that day, as I was about to discover.

Solna

I'd planned a little trip to Solna because it's fast developing into the Stratford of Stockholm.  What was just a single stop on the Pendeltåg has been joined in recent years by the terminus of the Tvärbanan, the cross-city tram line, and is about to get the end of the Green Line extension too.

One of the main reasons for this significant upgrade in facilities was the construction of what is currently known (for sponsorship reasons) as the Strawberry Arena.  This is the Swedish FA's new national stadium (which is why the new Green Line station will be called Arenastaden rather than Solna).  It's also the home of the AIK football team and, as it turned out, they were having a match not long after I arrived at the station, meaning there were crowds of people in scarves heading that way.  I decided to skip having a look at the arena and instead went into the nearby Mall of Scandinavia to find myself a sandwich.

It's a Westfield Mall and if you told me they'd copied and pasted the plans for Westfield Stratford and added Swedish subtitles I'd have believed you.  Inside it was the same copy book of dark malls constantly curving around on themselves so you couldn't see what was ahead, facilities hidden to the side, pointless kiosks getting in your way.  Lots of glowing lights and not much actual substance.

I ate my sandwich on the plaza outside, watching the crowds push by, then walked round the block to the back entrance to Solna.  This was a lot quieter, as it opened out into a residential district, and the only excitement here was some lads with backpacks being dropped off by a very battered car.

But wait!  There is a little more.  I couldn't let my final post about Stockholm go by without mentioning The Art.

By Olle Brand, it's this odd bronze shape on the platform.  It can't compete with the magnificence of Solna Centrum... but let's face it, what can?

Notes from a Tramline

The Lidingöbanan is a tram line that goes from Ropsten to Gåshaga Brygge on the island of Lidingö.  Like much of Stockholm's light rail networks, it's spent much of its life being threatened with closure.  Indeed, it used to have a second branch, one that went into the town of Lidingö itself, but that was closed decades ago.  The existing line only clung on because it passed the huge AGA factory and was useful for the workers; now, in the 21st century, the line is being celebrated as the valuable transport link it is.

The eventual hope is that it will be extended south on the Ropsten side, along the docks, encouraging regeneration there and facilitating homes and businesses to be built, before joining up with the Spårväg City tramline.  That would enable journeys between destinations on the east of the city without needing to go into the centre of Stockholm, and would give T-Centralen yet another destination.  Funding is, of course, the problem, with SL prioritising the T-bana extensions and the Roslagsbanan improvements first.

Sat at home in front of my computer, I'd thought "and obviously once I get to Ropsten I'll simply collect all twelve stops on the Lidingöbanan as well."  I'd not realised how tired I'd be after collecting 100 stations, or how melancholic at knowing my trip was coming to an end.  Instead I took the escalator down from the T-bana station and sat on a tram and simply rode it.  As I did, I made a load of notes - impressions, really - of what was happening as I travelled and what I saw.  That's what follows in this blog post.  Think of it as sketching rather than proper writing.

Tram is new and quick.  Vague sound of a noisy child somewhere at the back.  A couple chat, continuously, casually.  Across the way, a handsome man in a blue linen shirt and jeans.

Electric whirr and we're away.  Over the new bridge, speeding up to the central hump.  Ticket inspector appears in a baseball cap and scans my app. On the island now, drop into a gully for Torsvik, a high wall of red rock soaring up.  You have to ring the bell to stop the tram, like a bus.  Cruise ships in port across the water.  Handsome Man has closed his eyes to doze.

More rocky walls at Baggeby plus the hint of a red home poking over the trees.  More trees and a neatly mown embankment then concrete and cars at Bodal.  Handsome Man has woking up and is resting his Adidases on the seat support in front.  Larsberg, and a university building, then an ICA supermarket and the first visible apartment buildings.  Feels so rural here the apartments seem out of place.  You hear island, you think out of the way.

The round roofs of the depot as we approach AGA.  Is this the same AGA as the posh cookers?  I've never really found out.  People get on - a man with a moustache and thick glasses, two teenage girls in matching white blouses.  1920s factory building - is it still in use?  The noisy baby is now a crying baby.

Skärsätra has an old fashioned waiting room, with tiled roof and wooden walls, set back from the narrow tram platform.  The baby and her mother got off here.  Tram is quiet and smooth.  We skip Kottla - nobody rang the bell - and a spurt of speed through the woods, rocky embankments whizzing past.  A level crossing holds back a single car.  Högsberga is a proper village with many passengers waiting.  Dark wooden maisonette homes, a sports field with goal.  

Brevik has five storey apartment blocks and another tram waiting on the opposite platform.  We pause together, then move in opposing directions.  Handsome Man has sat silently the whole trip, not checking his phone once, and alights at Käppala alongside a bullet-headed bald man.  Another old shelter but this one is covered with wooden shutters.  Allotments at the side of the track - upside down umbrellas to collect the rain - light industry starting to appear at Gåshaga.  Port industries.  

Final stretch.  Scaffolding and more red houses.  Newer apartments built for the tram.  

Terminus.

I got off the tram and had a wander round Gåsjaga brygga.  There's not much to it; an ostentatious building that once held a cafe but is now closed, some apartment blocks built for the view.  The main attraction here is the ferry dock.

I thought about getting a ferry.  Not sure where to, just jumping aboard.  Part of me wanted to do that for the rest of the day, for the rest of the year.  Island hopping, passing round the archipelago, visiting the different ports.

If I'd started I'd have never got back to England.  I'd be bushy bearded, wearing raggedy clothes, the ghost of a ferry traveller haunting all the docks.  Whispered about by the crews.

Instead I went back to the tram.  I had to, really.  And I love a tram.

Stating The Obvious

 

When you're designing art for a metro station, there's something to be said for being extremely obvious.  Sure, you might want to put in a mural that represents the deep agonies of the human soul, or a statue of a bent wing to symbolise the fragility of existence, but people are only going to be on the platform for ten minutes at most.  It sometimes pays to be blunt at to the point.  If your station is named after a venerable scientific institution, then you fill that station with venerable scientific motifs.

Tekniska högskolan is next to the Kungliga Tekniska högskolan, the Royal Institute of Technology and one of the top Scandinavian universities, and as such its platforms are swarming with fractals, formulae, and other things I'm not entirely clear on because I only got a B in GCSE Science.  (Incidentally, if you're wondering why the station isn't called Kungliga Tekniska högskolan as well, it's because the "Royal" part is conferred upon the university, while the station only serves it so can't claim the same.  It's a pedantic but quite sweet little note).  

Lennat Mörk, the artist, was also a scenic designer for theatre and opera, which explains how over the top Tekniska högskolan is.  Apparently in the part of the station devoted to the four elements he wanted there to be actual flames and shoots of water until it was politely explained to him that it would be a nightmare to maintain.  Instead he hung a giant apple from the roof, to represent the one that hit Newton on the head and gave him the idea for mavity.

If that fell on your head mind you'd be crushed to death.  I think that's how I want to go.  He died doing what he loved; standing on an underground platform beneath a piece of elaborate art.

There are friezes of works by Copernicus and da Vinci, and polyhedra for the elements, and it's all delightfully bonkers.  If you're going to go crazy with your design, go proper crazy, that's what I say.

I emerged on the Valhallavägen, a long avenue of trees that skims the top of the Östermalm district of the city centre.  It was still early on a weekend so the road was largely deserted of traffic and people.  Behind me was Stockholms Östra station, the terminus of the Roslagsbanan, still clinging on until they finally get to build that tunnel to T-Centralen and it becomes a lot of lovely valuable real estate.

If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you'll know I do love a stadium, and I especially love an Olympic stadium.  Stockholm hosted the fifth Summer Olympics in 1912, as well as the Equestrian events for the 1956 Melbourne Olympics (there were strict quarantine laws in Australia at the time so the horses couldn't be shipped over).  The stadium is the oldest Olympic venue still in use.

It's a curious building.  Designed by Torben Grut, it came at a weird point in architecture, where the elaborate Victorian Gothic styles were falling out of fashion, but they hadn't yet embraced the glamorous minimalism of Art Deco.  As a consequence, the stadium sort of looks like a Medieval castle, but at the same time, doesn't; it has buttresses and towers and arrow slits, but it's also elegantly understated.

They were in the middle of setting it up for an event so I couldn't go in and have a poke around.  It looks like it'd be a fantastic place for an event.  Stockholm 1912 was Sweden's only bite of the Olympic cherry, and it's hard to see it ever hosting a Summer Games again; I think we've reached the point where Only Cities Of Five Million People Or More May Apply now (unless Qatar decides to put in a bid, at which point the IOC will bend over backwards to accommodate them).  Sweden did apply for the 2026 Winter Games, with most of the outdoor events scheduled to be held out in Åre, and Stockholm hosting the indoors; they lost to Milan-Cortina d'Ampezzo, meaning that bizarrely, Sweden is still yet to host a Winter Olympics.  

A large inner city sports arena needs a large inner city metro station, and Stadion doesn't disappoint.  The subway from the street to the platforms is a lot of pictures of wholesome Swedish people winning medals and trophies.  Over the years the Stadion has been home to football teams, bandy teams, and ice hockey matches, while concerts have regularly played there.

At the foot of the escalators there's a poster for those 1912 games.  As I said, keep it simple, stupid.  Olympic Stadium?  Olympic poster.

There's also a giant S, to point you to the Stadion, in the colours of Djurgården, who played there until they moved to the Tele2...

...and on the opposite wall, an M made out of a musical note, to point you to the Musikhögskolan - the Royal College of Music.

It's the central, crossover chamber that really captures your attention.

There's no real reason for there to be a rainbow there.  It doesn't mean anything.  All it's for is to be pretty.  But aren't you glad they did?

I can't imagine anyone wandering off their train, unaware of the station's architect, and not smiling when they see that.  It's pure joy.  I love the T-bana for making me happy in a thousand ways.  

Bullet Points

 

This blog's going to be a bit different.  This one's more of a list.

(Did some of you sigh with relief?  How dare you).

There are four stations at the very top of the Red line that I'm going to cover in this post.  Mörby Centrum, Danderyds sjukhus, Bergshamra, and Universitetet.  Bergshamra is on a peninsula, with the T-bana skipping under water either side of it, and sat at home in England I really wasn't sure if there was a way to cross that water as a pedestrian.  The road bridges that also crossed them were motorways, and I wasn't confident that I could walk alongside them.  I decided that Bergshamra would have to be a "visit then get on the next train out" station.  

On top of that, Universitetet station is at the centre of a national park, the Norra Djurgården.  Walking south from there to the city was an unknown quantity for me.  I didn't know if that would be a gentle stroll south or a knee-busting hike over mountains - again, sat in front of a computer in Merseyside, I couldn't be sure.  So Universititet would also be a "visit then get on the next train out station".

Then, because it was early on a Saturday morning and I was still half asleep, I went to Mörby Centrum, then went and got the train to Danderyds sjukhus, because in my head I wasn't going to do any walking at all.  It was only when I reached Danderyds sjukhus that I thought "I should've walked here" and, yeah, that's what my planning spreadsheet had on it.

I cocked that bit up basically.  So rather than my thoughts about the bits inbetween the stations, all you've got is my thoughts about the stations.  Sorry/you're welcome* (*delete as appropriate, depending on how bored of hearing about Stockholm you are).

Mörby Centrum

I arrived to find Mörby Centrum wasn't in the best condition.  There's been a shopping centre here since the Sixties and it appeared it was in the middle of one of its periodic rebuilds.  Stepping outside was a mix of concrete, wires and diversions.

Of course, this being Sweden, the shopping centre wasn't actually open at eight in the morning.  In the UK they'd be grabbing people off the train and dragging them up to Starbucks to get them caffeined up for a day of bouncing round the shops.  Over here, nothing was opening until ten, and if you didn't like it, tough.

I wandered out into the public square but it was a mess of concrete barriers and signs telling me just how good Mörby Centrum would be one day so I turned round and walked back down to the platform.  As I said, I should've actually walked out to the next station, but it was all so unpleasant and uninviting I think my brain over rode the logic centre and told me that being on a platform underground would be much nicer.  Also, as I mentioned, it was eight in the morning, and I was on Day Five of clattering round Stockholm.  I was a little bit exhausted.

I like the very Eighties sign for the shopping centre though.

Below ground we're back in the caves and, more particularly, pastel caves.  The artists have gone for pink and white in the main which gives it the slight air of a 1980s bedroom to it.  It really needs a Samantha Fox poster and some Bros playing.

Mörby Centrum wasn't intended to be the end of the line; it was built with overrunning tunnels so that the Red Line could continue on to Täby.  The residents of that town didn't want the T-bana, though, because its arrival would mean they'd lose their own light railway, the Roslagsbanan.  They voted to keep the smaller trains and the Red Line stopped here.

I had plenty of time to explore because on a Saturday morning the trains are extremely infrequent.  I'd got so used to turn up and go over the week that having to actually wait for a train was quite irritating.  Even more irritatingly, SL have implemented a system for partially sighted people so they know which side to get the next train from; a relentless clicking noise to guide them to the right platform.  A lovely gesture that drives you slowly mad as you wait for your train to leave.

Danderyds sjukhus

The station for the Danderyds sick house, I mean hospital, certainly lives up to its name.  It's right underneath the hospital, and the signage on the platform actually points out what exit you need for which department.

I thought the art on the platform walls would be something light and comforting as befits a hospital.  Something reassuring as you turn up with an exploded gall bladder or for your cancer diagnosis.

Nope!  It's isolated figures casting long dramatic shadows.  It's more like an advert for the Samaritans - it can seem like you're alone, but give us a call.

You couldn't have sprung for a few bright colours, SL?  A child playing or a smiling nurse?

Bergshamra

My abiding memory of Bergshamra is not the station itself, or the neat little town centre outside welcoming me to the Royal National City Park, but the pile of bright orange vomit by one of the benches.  Actually it wasn't bright orange, it was more like mango pulp, splattered across the platform, a lovely little reminder of somebody's Friday night.

Don't worry, I didn't take a picture of it.  

This station's best piece of art is the long coloured strip along the platform wall.  It's been painted to slowly shift from one end of the spectrum to the other; simple but effective.

A handy reminder that you don't need to spend millions to make The Art in your station pleasing and distinctive.  Something we could perhaps learn back in the UK.

Universitetet

At Universitetet I actually went for a bit of a wander.  I always like a university campus.  They're lively, exciting places, hopping with youthful enthusiasm and the heady whiff of intellectual stimulation.

Whenever I'm on a campus, I think how much fun it would be to study again, and maybe I should look into doing a course or something.  Then I remember I'm 47.  Going back to university as a mature student is a very different experience.  I remembered those intense, killjoy mature students in my classes who wanted to learn and who didn't show up for lectures stinking of Newky Brown from the night before.  I don't really want to study again, I want to be 20 again, and free of responsibilities and adulthood.

Having depressed myself by thinking about the inevitable march towards death, I walked across to Universitetet's other station, with the same name.  This is on the Roslagsbanan.  That network has constantly had a threat of closure hanging over it.  It operates on a narrow gauge of 891mm, a gauge unique to Sweden, and is the last railway to carry regular services over it (the others have either become museum pieces or converted to regular trains).

The problem has always been: this is undeniably a useful network, but is this really the most efficient way to get people into Stockholm?  Worse, it terminates on the edge of the city centre, in an above ground station.  For years it was treated as the unwanted stepchild of the network, until a few years ago, SL finally decided they'd spend some money on it.  They double tracked most of the route, they rebuilt Universitetet as a proper station with lifts and so on, and they announced they would dig a tunnel under the city centre so that the Roslagsbanan could intersect with the mainline at Odenplan at T-Centralen.  Yes, this will mean yet another layer of tunnelled platforms at Stockholm Central; they really do love digging underground in Sweden.

Preliminary works, however, found various engineering challenges for the tunnels south of Universitetet, which meant the project has been delayed; they're currently finalising a new route for consultation.  It means the new tunnels won't be completed for another decade at least.

The Art at Universitetet is by Françoise Schein, a Belgian artist.  It's based around the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights and she's put similar artwork in other metro stations - Concorde in Paris, for example, and Parque in Lisbon.

It doesn't sing for me.  It's nice that she's given you something to read while you wait for your train (though my Guide to the Art in the Stockholm Metro sniffily notes that she's not used any Swedish vowels - no Å, Ä or Ö - which is a bit rude) and of course it is a very important document, but still: it's a bit "is that it?"

I suppose it has the unfortunate position of being on the Stockholm Tunnelbana.  On those other metros, a station decorated in an artistic way is a surprise and different.  Here, it's just another station, and compared with some of the others, it's lacking.

Françoise's design for the emergency exit, though, is fantastic.  She should've done more of that.

Not much left now, folks.