At the time of writing the #CrossBorderRail project has taken me to 258 international railway lines in Europe (all mapped here). Not bad for a small crowd funded project that has been going for just over two years. Through sheer perseverance and energy invested, I have somehow become the go to person on social media and even somewhat in mainstream media about the politics of international rail, and there is a sort of community – in Mastodon in particular – around the hashtag.
Writing up the political conclusions and editing all the photos (some on Flickr here already) from the work in South Eastern Europe earlier this year is my short term priority, and throughout the rest of August and into September I will make a few day trips to a few more borders – taking the borders total to something like 275. I will also be making some speeches and presentations about what I have learned – likely at events in Warszawa, Berlin and Mulhouse.
But what comes next?
“Is there anything left to visit?” someone asked me recently.
The answer in Europe is, yes there is, but all the interesting borders I am yet to visit are in central Europe and on Europe’s eastern border. I have had a go at mapping the borders I still aim to visit, eliminating dismantled lines that have no prospect of re-opening, and focusing on already active lines. A central Europe – eastern borders project in 2025 would make a lot of sense to complete these routes. But I am not quite obsessive enough to want to try to visit every last border!
More widely, I wonder how to best adapt the #CrossBorderRail method as a means to examine other railway issues, but shift the focus away from cross border infrastructure. A first effort at this was going hunting for the cross border Régiolis trains that are meant to run on France-Germany regional lines.
In that vein I would like to run a project in 2025 called #CrossChannelRail – to go and examine all the places that would like direct through trains to London, and assess the prospects that this could happen. It would essentially turn this huge blog post about the topic into a project on the ground.
More generally my personal situation is going to change from the end of September – when I will be moving to live in Ravières in Bourgogne in France, and abandoning my base in Berlin. This means I will have much lower costs than currently, and should give me time and space to consider other ways to pursue cross border rail work. Plenty of people have suggested I ought to turn this project into a book (although the process of doing so fills me with fear!) or I might do some more video work, explaining the situation at every border that way.
If you have a bright idea of what you think I ought to do, I would be happy to hear it – especially (and sorry to sound mercenary) if there is a way to finance it!
