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In the early morning light of what felt like a frigid January morning, a CN westbound freight is seen track level approaching the Canoe River bridge. Hiding behind the low hanging clouds, fresh snow has just dropped on the rockies, signalling the approach of winter weather. Fall doesn't last for long in this region, snow would soon blanket the whole area two weeks after my visit to Yellowhead pass.
The one shot I was after while away; we stayed at a hotel in Turin which was part of Fiat's old Lingotto factory until the seventies. This is eight portrait shots, second attempt, at a time when there was no-one else in sight, thirty-degree heat in an extremely perilous crouch at the very top of the bank.
The building atop, the Pinacoteca Giovanni e Marella Agnelli Art Gallery - not the ugly, incongruous glass and steel one being built behind - contains an exhibition full of works by Canaletto, Matisse, Picasso, Modigliani and others. I love this place.
The factory was completed in 1923. Unlike any other car factory to date, the factory featured a spiral assembly line that moved up through the building and a concrete banked rooftop test track. It was the biggest car factory Europe had ever seen and was the second largest in the world.
Designed by engineer Giacomo Mattè-Trucco, the five story building featured a simple loop rooftop test track with two banked turns that consumed a 1620 foot x 280 foot portion of rooftop. The test track's banked turns were constructed from an intricate series of concrete ribs in a construction technique that had not been used frequently before Lingotto's construction. It's safe to say the technique had never been used for a test track six stories in the air.
The rooftop test track at Lingotto was not a novelty or an afterthought, but an integral part of the manufacturing process; the Lingotto factory featured a unique upward spiral assembly line. As each Fiat was put together it would progress upwards through the building story by story. Each floor was sequentially designated to specialize in a major part of assembly. What would start on the ground floor as raw materials and individual parts became a running driving Fiat by the time it spiraled its way to the top of the building.
When a Fiat had finished its climb through the 16,000,000 square feet of Lingotto it exited the building by way of the roof. Each Fiat was taken on to the roof and around the banked race track to make sure the prior five floors of manufacturing had done their jobs to satisfaction. The Lingotto test track was even briefly featured in the Italian Job. During the famous escape sequence the red white and blue Mini's go three wide on the banked rooftop race course with police in hot pursuit.
If you're in Turin, go. It's worth the trip. Plus you can go to the track for free if you use a little confidence or you can buy a ticket for the exhibition and go with your ticket.
A track I often walk through forest down the hill at the end of our street. There is a little barricade to stop bicycles which I took while spinning the camera and then used Photoshop to crop square and Distort>Polar co-ordinates. Surprisingly the wood work remained identifiable after such rough treatment!
1995 Cannondale Track, Black Campagnolo Shamal wheelset, Black Campagnolo Record crankset, Wound Up fork
Hohe Munde Ostgipfel (color)
www.redbubble.com/people/petercseke/works/18996793-hohe-m...
Resting and enjoying the sight on a wonderful winter hike around Seefeld in Tirol (Austria) ski paradise. The Hohe Munde Ostgipfel peak (Alps) and the great pine forests are dominating the surroundings, with some limited snow patches.
An old Track Marshall bulldozer enjoying some late autumn afternoon sun near Waituna West in the Manawatu - Rangitikei district.
In the distance are the Ruahine Ranges which before long are likely to be coated with winter snow!
© Dominic Scott 2024
CP 6304 leads a ballast train west up the Paynesville Subdivision, passing by a section of track ready for tie replacement.