Western Railroad Discussion > Roadside Attractions 3 "Over There"

This one sure caught me by surprise (and the poor photos demonstrate that rather nicely)  What the...?!     
So I cranked up google. 
A bit of digging and I found Photo 3.  It's a Renfe Series 442 "Platanito" tilting train set- the only one ever build.  It was an early attempt  (1976) to introduce high speed service in Spain, but failed because it was simply too complex and therefore too expensive to maintain.  It was tried in various routes out of Madrid, but after about 10yrs they gave up.  Somehow, nearly 40yrs later, here it sits.
SR

This one is a fair example of my decision to post this series on the Western Forum.  On the International Forum (and I will share it there) I kind of half expect that community will say, "Oh yeah, the Platanito.  Cool."
And I expect I'll gain a bit of good info for my efforts in return.
But here of the Western Forum I'm thinking the community reaction to be more like mine...   What the...?!
And that's the experience I wanted to share.

---

---

---

That is an interesting (maybe ungainly?) looking trainset....If you go west enough, you will get to Spain :). B

Renfe does seem to leave plenty of "canvas" sitting around to collect grafitti. But more surprising is the quantity of "art" on passenger rolling stock that is in daily use.
There seems to be a lot of retired equipment sitting around, enough to build a substantial rail museum (If there isn't one already?).
Gonut

Granted, I was just passing through so my observations were casual at best:
Like anywhere these days Spain has its share of graffiti, as does France, but it was hardly what I’d call “overwhelming”.
Except Renfe freight locomotives- dear god, they were over-the-top targets! Other Renfe infrastructure (other than common everyday walls) and their active passenger trains were only randomly tagged- and somewhat sparingly.
But freight locos?
Damn!

SR

I shot that train coming into Madrid Atocha station in May 1980.   Had no idea it was anything special.  The  slides are long gone via Ebay,.

You saw it in service? That’s pretty cool! Was it in these same colors?
I read the name meant “little silver” or something similar. It implies maybe it was originally painted silver
SR