The railway age in the Austrian Empire began with the construction of the horse-drawn railway from Linz to Budweis. Plans soon followed to connect the imperial capital of Vienna with the iron and coal deposits in northern Moravia and with the port city of Trieste. In 1837 the Kaiser Ferdinands Nordbahn was opened, in 1857 the Semmeringbahn planned by Karl Ritter von Ghega, overcoming one of the most difficult obstacles on the way to the Adriatic. The crossing of the Alps by train, such as over the Arlberg or the Brenner, is still considered a unique engineering masterpiece. The expansion of the railway network brought epochal changes. Goods and people circulated on an unprecedented scale – life accelerated. It had succeeded in connecting the northern crown lands such as Silesia or Bohemia and Moravia with Carinthia, Tyrol or the coastal region.
Echt fett is an Austrian hidden camera television series. Like in e.g. Just for Laughs: Gags and Trigger Happy TV, it exclusively shows clips of how unsuspecting subjects are brought into unusual situations by actors while being filmed with a hidden camera. A typical clip is filmed on the streets, or in a shopping mall. The comedic situations produced by the actors and the reactions of the unknowinlgy fooled are to entertain viewers. It was broadcast between 2003 and 2007.