station clock
{{Short description|Clock for railway passengers and staff}}
File:Clock tower, Waterbury Union Station.jpg with station clock, Waterbury Union Station, Waterbury, Connecticut, USA.]]
A station clock is a clock at a railway station that provides a standard indication of time to both passengers and railway staff.
A railway station will often have several station clocks. They can be found in a clock tower, in the booking hall or office, on the concourse, inside a train shed, on or facing the station platforms, or elsewhere.
Design
The design of station clocks in Europe was formerly quite diverse. Today, the majority of them are derived from the Swiss railway clock designed by Hans Hilfiker, a Swiss engineer, in 1944 when he was an employee of the Swiss Federal Railways.{{cite web |url=http://www.swissworld.org/en/switzerland/swiss_specials/swiss_watches/the_swiss_railway_clock/ |title=Remarkable clocks and watches: the Swiss railway clock |work=swissworld.org |publisher=Presence Switzerland, Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs FDFA |location=Berne, Switzerland |access-date=2014-12-11}} In 1953, Hilfiker added a red second hand to its design in the shape of a railway guard's signaling disc. The technical implementation of the railway clock, the central synchronization by a master clock, was engineered together with Mobatime, a clock manufacturer still producing the Swiss railway clock as well as the German railway clock besides many others.{{cite book |editor=Köbi Gantenbein |title=Die Bahnhofsuhr – Ein Mythos des Designs aus der Schweiz |year=2013 |publisher=Edition Hochparterre |location=Zurich, Switzerland |language=de |url=http://www.hochparterre.ch/publikationen/buecher/edition-hochparterre/shop/artikel/detail/die-bahnhofsuhr/ |access-date=2014-10-19 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141104032826/http://www.hochparterre.ch/publikationen/buecher/edition-hochparterre/shop/artikel/detail/die-bahnhofsuhr/ |archive-date=2014-11-04 }}{{cite web |url=http://www.mobatime.com/references/applications/public-transport.html |title=Mobatime – Swiss Time Systems: References |publisher=MOSER-BAER SA |location=Sumiswald, Bern, Switzerland |access-date=2014-10-19}}
Modern European station standard station clock designs have a white clock face that is illuminated in the dark, bar shaped black coloured marks or scales, but no numbers, at the periphery of the clock face dial, and bar-shaped hour and minute hands, also coloured black. The second hand on these standard designs is a thin bar, thickened or fitted with a disc at the peripheral end, and often coloured red. Such clock designs are easily legible from a distance.
Examples
File:Clock in Kings Cross.jpg|King's Cross, London
File:Hamburg HBF Uhr 02 (RaBoe).jpg|Hamburg Hauptbahnhof
File:Gare de Lyon xCRW 1311.jpg| Gare de Lyon, Paris
File:2010-10-13-london-by-RalfR-046.jpg|Waterloo, London
File:LindauBahnhof1.jpg|Round face, with curved pointers.
File:Bürk Außenuhr.JPG|Square face, with straight edged pointers.
File:LindauBahnhof3.jpg|Modern German station clock next to split-flap display board.
File:Heidelberg Hbf Uhr.jpg|Customised design {{nowrap|(Heidelberg Hbf)}}
File:Bahnhofsuhr Aarau.jpg|Aarau station clock with a 9 m diameter
File:BahnhofsuhrZuerich RZ.jpg|Swiss railway clock, the "mother" of the modern railway clocks
File:Stationsklok Antwerpen Centraal.jpg|Belgium
File:Bahnhof Kinding (Altmühltal), Bahnsteiguhr 2007.jpg|Classic German DB station clock
File:Den Haag Hollands spoor.JPG|Dutch NS station clock
File:Jakarta MRT Station Clock.jpg|Jakarta MRT station clock
See also
{{Portal|Trains}}
References
=Notes=
{{Reflist}}
=Bibliography=
{{refbegin}}
- {{cite book|last=Lyman|first=Ian P|title=Railway Clocks|year=2004|publisher=Mayfield Books|location=Mayfield, Ashbourne, Derbyshire, England|isbn=0954052560}}
{{refend}}
External links
- [http://www.scotcities.com/railways/clocks.htm Railway Station Clocks - Architecture of Time]
{{commonscat-inline|Station clocks}}
{{Rail tracks}}