Trains, Balloons and Automobiles

I have died and arrived in train spotting heaven.

The Train Positions map combines a live real-time map of Dutch trains with the locations of traffic webcams. The result is that you can track the positions of trains in real-time and actually see them pass locations on live webcams.

Unfortunately a lot of the webcams featured in the Train Positions map are currently offline or have poor views of the passing trains. Nevertheless there are still some gems to be found. My favorite is the webcam of a level crossing at Mierlo-Hout, east of Eindhoven (shown in the animated GIF above). This provides a great view of the train line, with the added bonus that you know when a train is coming because of the level crossing warning lights and chimes (obviously you can also see it arriving on the map).

If train-spotting is not nerdy enough for you then you might prefer the SondeHub Tracker live map, which allows you to follow the paths of weather balloons in real-time. 

A radiosonde is a meteorological instrument used to measure and transmit atmospheric data. The instrument is carried aboard a weather balloon and sends its data to a ground station in real-time by radio signal. The SondeHub Tracker is a live real-time map of active radiosondes (an historical view of past flights is also available), which is used to assist with the tracking, recovery and re-use of meteorological radiosondes.

As well as showing the real-time position of active radiosondes the map also shows the past flight-path of the radiosonde, its predicted forward path, and (where in operation) the real-time position of the chase car.