trains

Ticket to Ride is another solid iPad adaptation of a classic board game, which has the same name, in which you race other players to build railroad routes across a map of the U.S. and southern Canada.

Fans of the board game (and its online version) will find this a satisfying reproduction of the original--but, of course, with the added bonus of not having to fumble with all the little pieces, cards, and bookkeeping. You can play a solo game in about 15 minutes, with no cleanup. If you don't know the game already, it's pretty easy … Read more

I have a skeptical view of education. It doesn't seem to be that those who have more of it necessarily become more interesting, or even more useful.

As my evidence, might I present this cell phone video, uploaded to YouTube, which shows an interesting and intellectual discussion between a conductor and a passenger on a Metro North train in New York.

It seems the woman might have been disturbing some passengers with the volume and vocabulary of her cell phone conversation. That would mirror an incident earlier this year when a woman was ejected from an Amtrak train after … Read more

HAMBURG, Germany--Sure, Miniatur Wunderland is the world's largest collection of model trains, but to describe it that way would do it a serious injustice. What it really is is a beyond-belief collection of fantastic dioramas depicting scenes from the Swiss and Austrian Alps, Germany, the United States, and Scandinavia throughout which run 900 trains on the more than eight miles of tracks.

I had planned to come here as part of Road Trip 2011, because I'd read that Miniatur Wunderland had recently added a giant scale model of a working airport. And when I looked into that, I … Read more

SEDRUN, Switzerland--I'm a kilometer inside one of the Alps and nearly 800 meters below the surface, and it's pitch black. And I'm falling at 14 meters a second.

But this isn't a story of fire and brimstone. It's a story of the construction of the world's longest tunnel, a new 57 kilometer all-flat rail line deep under the Swiss Alps that is planned to open in 2017 and which is hoped to double the capacity of cargo along the crucial Zurich to Milan line. It's also Switzerland's largest-ever ecological project.

This is … Read more

Imagine someone who is brand-spanking new to the Internet. Setting them loose in a browser with no guidance would be like directing a horse and buggy onto an L.A. freeway at rush hour. You could look over their shoulder as they discover the joys and pitfalls of the top Web sites, or you could simply send them a link to the free Internet-training videos at Grovo.

The company has created dozens of short videos covering just about every activity a person is likely to do on the Web. The videos last from less than a minute to more than … Read more

Safety issues aside, only three things are required to be happy in your job: do interesting work, get paid fairly, and get along with your boss. I can't help you with the last one, but if you're not happy with the work you're doing or your salary, one possible solution is to learn new skills that will translate into more challenging and financially rewarding work.

Tongue-in-cheek suggestions for avoiding the ax Any employment-related advice on the Web or elsewhere has to be taken with a grain of salt, especially when it comes to generic recommendations about successful … Read more

The U.S. railroad is about to get a minor makeover.

Axion International has won a $15 million contract to make railroad ties made from recycled plastic, the company announced yesterday.

The railroad ties will specifically be made of Recycled Structural Composite (RSC), the signature recycled plastic composite developed by Axion in conjunction with Rutgers University. RSC is a thermoplastic composite produced from 100 percent recycled consumer plastics (such as milk jugs and laundry detergent bottles) and industrial plastic waste.

Axion's deal to provide replacement railroad ties over the next three years is with an unnamed company purported to … Read more

The FBI is on the hunt for the hackers responsible for a recent wave of cyberattacks launched in defense of WikiLeaks.

FBI agents yesterday executed more than 40 search warrants in the United States as part of their ongoing investigation. Pointing to the group Anonymous, which has taken responsibility for the attacks, the FBI said that the distributed denial of service (DDoS) assaults were facilitated by software the group makes available as free downloads.

Late last year, PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, and other companies were hit by DDoS attacks triggered by activists in support of WikiLeaks after the companies cut off … Read more

If you're like most folks, your New Year's resolutions included something like "lose weight" or "get in shape." Easier said than done, right?

Try FitnessClass, a new iPad app that serves up more than 200 workout videos. No trips to the gym, no fitting your workouts to someone else's schedule--just on-demand professional classes for just about any kind of workout you want: fat burning, core strengthening, arm toning, and so on.

In fact, you can search for classes based on your goal (weight loss, strength, etc.), the time you have available (from 10 … Read more