On Monday, a small group that rarely takes the public stage stepped out from behind the shadows in to the lobby of Taipei Main Station.
Lin Heng-lee (林恆立), a self-identified rail enthusiast with a particular interest in model trains, had brought along his best dioramas, including one of the Alishan Forest Railway. Perfected over months, it is a lush mountainscape with vegetation, rocks, tunnels and a tiny Shay locomotive that gamely makes its way across rough trackage and sharp curves.
“I’ve been to most train stations around Taiwan,” Lin, 36, said. “After I go, I like to build models [of them].”
Photo: Enru Lin, Taipei Times
There are many other ways to be a rail fan, Lin added. While far from being a mainstream activity, Taiwan’s rail system hobbyists are a vibrant and diverse subculture.
Some conduct academic research, while others collect Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) memorabilia such as stamps, ticket stubs, timetables and official souvenirs.
Others focus their efforts on riding trains and recording the trek with a camera, happily snapping away from the window and uploading images to online communities like the Facebook group Taiwan Rail Family (台鐵家族), which has around 2,000 members.
Photo: Enru Lin, Taipei Times
There are those who like to chase trains, an activity that is said to induce an adrenaline rush for enthusiasts.
“You take pictures of a train at one railway level crossing, and then you drive a car to intercept it at the next railway level crossing,” said a hobbyist surnamed Shen (沈).
“I don’t do much chasing anymore, but I do photograph trains at a train station. I just wait for them to come in,” he said.
For devotees like Shen, the train is a comforting marker of happy times.
“When I was little I lived in Beitou and went to Zhongshan Elementary School. Every day I took the Tamsui line to Shuanglien [train] station and then walked to school. It’s a pretty good memory,” he said.
Rail fans have their own bimonthly magazine — Rail News (鐵道情報) — edited by Ku Ting-wei (古庭維), who is famed for his interest in decommissioned lines.
They also have a rich selection of support groups. For model building alone there are three major associations — Taiwan Train Society (鐵道模型交流空間), CMRA (中華民國鐵道模型研究發展協會) and XN Club (XN鐵道模型俱樂部) — that allow enthusiasts to pool resources and offer tips.
Adopt a train station
Han Bi-feng (韓筆鋒), a rail buff and retired Air Force colonel, created his own group in his hometown of Taitung to repair the rundown Ruihe (瑞和) station.
“Twelve years ago I went back and it was a mess. I wanted to make it prettier,” he said.
Ruihe is a vacant station, a TRA stop with no attendants or cleaning staff, only the intermittent local train carrying students.
“Our community got together and we adopted it — we secured funds from the county government, planted trees, swept out the dust and put up historic photos,” he said on Monday, after traveling to Taipei to attend the TRA’s 127th anniversary program, which marks the anniversary of the 1887 start of construction of a rail line between Keelung and Taipei, begun under the Qing administration. During the Japanese colonial era, the Ministry of Taiwan Railway expanded the line to Kaohsiung, along with other rail lines.
Han said he grew up with the TRA, which was established in 1945 following the end of World War II. As a teen, he traversed 40km of rickety narrow tracks every day for an hour to get to school.
“It was quite slow back then, but the Hualien-Taitung line has always been beautiful. There is also a warm humanity to it — the trains react to people,” he said.
Over the years Han has collected oral histories, including the story of a woman who went into labor and missed her train. The station master arranged for her to board a sugarcane train so she could check into the town hospital, he said.
“Back then, maybe regulations were not so strict,” Han said.
In 2010, Han made a documentary, The Man of the Eastern Railway (東線鐵路人), which consisted of footage gathered while traveling along the east coast.
“I filmed it before construction began on the new electrified lines — I knew that once the lines went up, the landscape would be entirely different,” he said.
Today, new double tracks along the Hualien-Taitung line are nearing completion, and the diesel units will be swapped out for electric trains by the end of the month as part of a nation-wide rail electrification project. But even with the TRA’s evolving look, the railway for Han serves as a pleasant reminder of the easygoing Taiwanese.
“Maybe you want to buy a ticket online and you wait around but can’t get one. Someone at the station will take down your name and wait around online to buy it for you, then give you a call,” he said.
“That is still the way it is today. There are lots of good feelings between the rail and the community,” he said.
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