PHOTOS: Chanukah in Jerusalem

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With Chanukah starting tonight at sundown, starting this morning, Egged buses in Jerusalem started alternating a "Happy Chanukah" greeting with the bus's destination.  This will likely continue through the end of the holiday.  Egged does this for other holidays throughout the year as well.  Except for the 17 that I caught flipping between signs, all of the buses below are showing the "Happy Chanukah" sign.



















I also got some photos of the light rail this evening.  My main goal was to show how Jaffa Road has changed from last Chanukah (when I got what were among my last photos of buses using this road) to now (with the testing and opening of the light rail).  The two photos were taken in the same place but I didn't get the angle exactly right tonight to make that as clear as I could have.

First night of Chanukah 5771/2010:


First night of Chanukah 5772/2011:


Here are my other light rail photos from tonight, you can notice that the Citypass logo are being added (unfortunately, since I think the trains look better with out it) to the ends of each car, there are also two logos on each side of each car:

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Here are photos that I took this morning and evening here in Jerusalem, most of the buses in these photos are displaying the "Happy Chanukah" message that has been alternating on the headsigns with the destinations since Tuesday morning.

Here are the buses wishing everyone a Happy Chanukah:









This bus is used by the Egged Driving School to train students in preparation for the necessary licensing test to be able to drive a bus.  The school is open to anyone wanting such a license, working for Egged afterwards is not required.  The Dan Bus Company, which operates most of the buses in the Tel Aviv area, has such a driving school as well.


This is the bus that was involved in the bus bombing in Jerusalem back in March.  I got a photo of it three days before the bombing, and wrote at the time that I wasn't sure what would happen to the bus, but that I hoped it would be returned to service to show the terrorists that we will not change our way of life in spite of their wishes, desires, and goals.  I'm not sure how long the bus has been back in service for, and this doesn't replace the life that was lost that afternoon, but I do see it as a small victory of sorts over terrorism.


Here are two photos of Mercedes-Benz O 405 G buses.  I've seen fewer of these recently as new buses have been delivered in the past year plus, though I enjoy riding them when I do get the chance.  With the way most Israelis drive, a ride in the back can be quite fun as the bus takes turns and goes over speed bumps and other rough spots on the roads at high speed.  I'll miss them once they are all dispatched to the big bus garage in the sky.




This is one of the newest MAN 12 meter (40 foot) buses that started running over the summer:


In this photo, you can see the long line of buses (mostly) waiting to come up this narrow street that is now the main thoroughfare for buses near the Mahane Yehuda Market in central Jerusalem.  The buses used to use Jaffa Road, but that is no longer open to traffic, most of the street has been turned into the light rail right of way and a pedestrian mall.  Until all the bus routes get modified to the new route network that feeds and compliments the light rail, all the buses that used to use Jaffa Road have to run on this narrow street instead.  Traffic here is usually a mess but throw in Thursday evening shoppers at the market (preparing for Shabbat) and it is worse than normal.  Often, if the street is so congested that buses can't turn onto it from the bottom, they take an alternate route that can leave passengers waiting by the market for their buses for 40-60 minutes, if not longer.  In my experience, it takes 15 minutes minimum most times of day to make it the half mile or so up this street, and sometimes it can take even longer. 


And here is one last photo with nothing really special about it