Swiss Central Railway
 Rümlingen viaduct built by the SCB
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| Swiss Central Railway 1861–1872 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 Far away from the city, a train leaves the first Lucerne station.
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The Swiss Central Railway ( SCB or SCB ) was one of the five large private railway companies in Switzerland . In 1902, the SCB was integrated into the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) with a route length of 332 kilometers .
history
Construction of the railway cross
The SCB, based in Basel , was founded on February 4, 1853 by Johann Jakob Speiser , Achilles Bischoff and Karl Geigy . The shares were mainly owned by Parisian banking houses. But Basel banks and the cantons of Basel-Stadt and Baselland were also involved. A share capital of 36 million and 12 million francs in bonds were planned. Speculation sverkäufe on the Paris stock exchange , however, led to a sharp fall was so that the value of SCB shares from 500 to 200 francs reduced and the share capital after all, only 14.5 million francs, was the cantons of Lucerne and Bern and Berner communities saved the Companies with support purchases and subsidies totaling 6 million francs.
The main goal of the SCB was to build a Swiss railway cross with the center of Olten . They wanted to forestall the people of Zurich who wanted to reach Basel via Turgi - Waldshut on the right bank of the Rhine in Baden . The canton of Solothurn initially wanted one only for the Hauenstein railway line to Olten concession granted. He wanted to force a direct line Olten - Solothurn - Biel instead of the branch line Herzogenbuchsee - Solothurn .
The granting of a license in Aargau was also controversial, as the battle between Basel and Zurich was fought in this canton . Zurich planned a connection with Neuchâtel in competition with SCB via Les Verrières to France. The canton of Baselland refused the concession of a Bötzbergbahn , which led to a great deal of dissatisfaction in Aargau. Nevertheless, the SCB finally received the concession for the Olten– Murgenthal and Aarburg - Zofingen sections . The section from Aarau to the canton border near Wöschnau, on the other hand, received the Nordostbahn (NOB).
Overcoming the Jura between Sissach and Olten with gradients of up to 26 per thousand and the 2.5 kilometer long Hauenstein tunnel from Läufelfingen to Trimbach , the longest tunnel in Switzerland at the time, was particularly difficult . Cost overruns and construction delays of more than a year led the SCB to the verge of ruin. 4 million francs in investment aid from the federal government and 12 million francs in bonds from Basel and Stuttgart banks ensured further financing in 1857.
From Basel, SCB was able to build the lines via Liestal- Olten to Bern , Aarau , Thun , Biel and Lucerne . In 1858 the SCB tracks were connected to those of the NOB near Aarau after the construction of the Schanz tunnel. In 1860 the network of the SCB grew together on the canton border near Bern with the Chemin de fer Lausanne-Friborg-Berne and on Lake Biel with the Ostwestbahn . In the same year, the French Eastern Railway linked its network with the Central Railway in Basel , with which the SCB was directly connected to the international railway network.
In the Olten train station there is a stone relief that documents the zero point of the distance measurement of the railway lines prescribed by the federal government. From the starting point in Olten, the SCB measured the routes in one hour . However, the stone never marked kilometer 0. When the old linear measurements were replaced by the meter in 1877 , the Centralbahn changed the distance designation of its railway lines. Since then, has Kilometrierung the SCB routes its starting point in Basel.
Workshop
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At Olten train station, SCB built the main workshop around 1855, which the first workshop manager, Niklaus Riggenbach , transformed from a workshop with the usual maintenance work into an industrial plant that also produced new locomotives and freight cars. Today's SBB industrial plant emerged from the main workshop.
Traffic development
The annual reports of SCB provide information on the rapidly growing volume of rail traffic on the network. After just a few years, the capacity of the Hauenstein line, at that time the only rail link from the Rhine Valley to the Swiss plateau, proved to be insufficient.
The SCB was of outstanding importance for the supply of Switzerland with imported goods such as grain or coal. Freight traffic had a correspondingly large and steadily growing weight. The improvement in the financial situation led to calls for a further expansion of the network.
Railroad crisis
| Swiss Central Railway 1880–1901 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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From 1872 the Swiss National Railway (SNB) tried to build up competition with the existing railway companies with a second railway connection between Lake Geneva and Lake Constance . Originally, the National Railway planned a route from Aarau via Olten through the Gäu to Solothurn and on to Lyss . Similar to the NOB, the SCB also embarked on daring construction commitments to defend the competition. In 1872, the SCB committed to the Canton of Solothurn to build the Gäubahn Olten – Solothurn – Lyss with the branch line Solothurn – Biberist . In return, the people of Solothurn demanded the construction of a waterfall railway from Liestal through the Jura to Solothurn and its continuation from Solothurn to Schönbühl near Bern. The SCB also undertook to build a local railway from Liestal to Waldenburg and to participate in the Sissach-Gelterkinden railway with a third of the construction costs. In order to finance the construction of the new lines and the expansion of the old network to double track , SCB increased its share capital from 37.5 to 50 million francs in 1873.
When Alsace-Lorraine came to Germany in 1871 after the Franco-Prussian War , efforts were made to establish a railway connection from Delle via Delsberg- Langenthal to Lucerne ( Jura-Gotthard Railway ). In addition, the Bern-Luzern-Bahn (BLB) planned an access to the Gotthard via Langnau . In order to defend itself against this double competition, the SCB started building a railway line Langenthal – Wauwil . It would have connected the Bern – Olten and Olten – Lucerne lines and significantly shortened the detour via Aarburg.
However, further fundraising ran into difficulties due to the economic crisis and led to significant restrictions in the construction program. The construction of the Wasserfallenbahn and the Langenthal – Wauwil line, in which CHF 3.5 million had already been invested, had to be stopped. The payment of dividends was stopped and the net income of 2½ years was used to write off the construction costs of the abandoned lines. The unrealized Wasserfallenbahn cost SCB in 1881 the deposit of 125,000 francs it had paid for the concession. The construction of the Waldenburgerbahn was left to a special undertaking.
The SCB had more success with the joint ventures with the NOB. From 1871 to 1875, the SCB, together with the NOB, built the Bözbergbahn from Pratteln to Brugg and from 1873 to 1882 a connection of its lines to the Gotthardbahn , the Aargauische Südbahn operated by the Centralbahn from Rupperswil via Wohlen to Immensee . The opening of these two routes led to a decrease in traffic on the Hauenstein line.
The construction of the Basel connecting railway also fell into this era . In the state treaty for the construction and operation of the Gotthand Railway , Switzerland undertook to connect its network with the Baden railways with a railway across the Rhine. The Basel connecting line was built by the SCB together with the Baden State Railways and put into operation on November 3, 1873. A year earlier, the section of the Alsatian line from the French border at St. Ludwig to the Centralbahnhof was transferred from the French Eastern Railway of the SCB by a federal decision. On 28 October 1872, the Saline nbahn Pratteln- Schweizerhalle commissioned.
Recovery and nationalization
With the opening of the Gotthard Railway, the SCB received a strong boom in 1882. Both passenger and freight traffic grew strongly and permanently. SCB shared half of the profit from the highly profitable Bötzbergbahn. The Southern Railway, which was initially in deficit, also made ample profits from 1882 onwards, half of which benefited the SCB. As early as 1873, the SCB was able to pay dividends to the shareholders again, which from 1898 to 1900 reached nine or more percent of the share capital value. This high remuneration to the shareholders shortly before the nationalization did not meet with approval everywhere.
The railway crisis had caused many local shareholders to sell their shares to domestic and foreign banks. The railroad stocks played an important role in the speculation of the stock market. Short-term profit maximization became the guiding principle for the new majority of the foreign shareholders. In 1887 and 1896 the management was replaced by a president who was more comfortable with the banks.
On May 30, 1898, a group of railway employees of the Centralbahn who were busy with track work at the southern exit of the Gütschtunnel near Lucerne was run over by a passenger train of the Nordostbahn. Seven railway workers were killed instantly and four seriously injured. On June 4, 1899, during the Aarau railway accident, the night express train Zurich - Geneva of the Nordostbahn (NOB) drove past the designated stopping point and hit two stationary locomotives of the Centralbahn. The accident left two dead and three seriously injured.
In 1891 a bank consortium offered the federal government the majority of shares in SCB. Politics would have had a greater influence on the SCB. However, a referendum was called against the purchase and the deal was rejected by the electorate because of the high costs. The nationalization of the SCB was only decided in 1898 with the adoption of the Buyback Act. The Centralbahn became the property of the federal government in 1902 and became part of the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB).
Infrastructure and vehicles
Train stations
Basel Centralbahnhof , 1861
Olten train station , around 1860
Olten train station, around 1900
Bern railway station , 1860
Bern train station with reception building from 1891
Biel station , reception building, 1864
Biel station, built in 1864
First train station in Lucerne
Lucerne, second train station built in 1896 on the left, pier on the right
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Route network
| No. | Railway line | Route section | opening | Double track | comment | length |
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| 1. | St. Ludwig – Basel | St. Ludwig - Basel St. Johann | (June 15, 1844) | (June 15, 1860) | May 1, 1872 by the EST taken | 3.5 km |
| Basel St. Johann– Basel Central Station | (June 15, 1860) | |||||
| 2. | Basel – Olten – Bern | Basel Centralbahnhof - Pratteln - Liestal | Dec. 19, 1854 | 1857 | Provisional Basel train station until June 3, 1860 | 108 km |
| Liestal - Sissach | June 1, 1855 | |||||
| Sissach– Läufelfingen | May 1, 1857 | May 1, 1857 | ||||
| Läufelfingen– Olten | May 1, 1858 | Sept. 1, 1858 | with Hauenstein tunnel | |||
| Olten– Aarburg | June 9, 1856 | 1858 | together with the Olten – Lucerne route | |||
| Aarburg - Rothrist | March 16, 1857 | 1874 | ||||
| Rothrist– Murgenthal | July 16, 1872 | |||||
| Murgenthal– Herzogenbuchsee | 1874 | |||||
| Herzogenbuchsee - Zollikofen | June 16, 1857 | June 1, 1896 | ||||
| Zollikofen – Bern Wylerfeld | 1864 | together with the Biel – Bern line of the BSB | ||||
| Bern Wylerfeld– Bern | Nov 15, 1858 | July 1, 1859 | together with the Bern – Thun line | |||
| 3. | Olten-Aarau | Olten – Wöschnau (canton border SO - AG ) | June 9, 1856 | July 16, 1872 | until April 30, 1858 provisional Aarau Schachen station | 13 km |
| Wöschnau– Aarau | May 15, 1858 | Property of the NOB , leased from SCB | ||||
| 4th | Bern – Thun – Scherzligen | Bern Wylerfeld– Gümligen | July 1, 1859 | - | together with the Berne – Lucerne line of the BSB | 29 km |
| Gümligen - Thun | ||||||
| Thun – Scherzligen | June 1, 1861 | Connection to Thunersee shipping | ||||
| 5. | (Olten–) Aarburg – Lucerne | (Olten–) Aarberg– Zofingen - Emmenbrücke | June 9, 1856 | - | 52 km | |
| Emmenbrücke underground | June 1, 1859 | |||||
| Underground Fluhmühle | June 1, 1859 | together with route train-Luzern the ZZL | ||||
| Fluhmühle - Lucerne | June 1, 1859 | Together with the Bern – Lucerne line of the BSB , the access to the new Lucerne train station changed from January 1, 1896 |
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| 6th | Herzogenbuchsee– (New Solothurn–) Solothurn | June 1, 1857 | - | until 1876 part of the Olten – Biel line | 13 km | |
| 7th | Gäubahn Olten – Biel (–Nidau) | Olten – New Solothurn | Dec. 4, 1876 | - | until 1876 connection via Herzogenbuchsee | 59 km |
| Solothurn - Biel | June 1, 1857 | until May 30, 1864 provisional Biel station | ||||
| Biel– Nidau | Aug 1, 1858 | Connection to Bielersee shipping, canceled on December 10, 1860 | (1 km) | |||
| New Solothurn - Biberist | Dec. 4, 1876 | Nov. 21, 1883 Handover to the Emmental Railway | (4 km) | |||
| 8th. | Bern – Thörishaus | Bern– Thörishaus station (canton border BE - FR ) | July 2, 1860 | - | Connection to the LFB line to Freiburg | 10 km |
| 9. | Pratteln - Schweizerhalle | Oct 28, 1872 | - | Connection of the Rhine saltpans | 2 km | |
| 10. | Neu-Solothurn – Busswil | Dec. 4, 1876 | - | in Busswil connection to the BSB | 21 km | |
| 11. | Zofingen – Suhr | (Sept. 6, 1877) | - | Built by the Swiss National Railway (SNB), taken over by NOB on April 1, 1881 | 17 km | |
| 12. | Basel connecting railway | Basel Centralbahnhof - Basel Badischer Bahnhof | (Nov. 3, 1873) | - | Joint venture between SCB and BadStB , integrated into SCB on January 1, 1884 | 4 km |
| Total (190) | 122 km (37%) | 332 km | ||||
| Lines operated jointly with other railways: | ||||||
| 1. | Suhr-Aarau | (Sept. 6, 1877) | - | built by Nationalbahn, taken over by SCB together with NOB on June 1st, 1880 | 24 km | |
| 2. | Aargau Southern Railway (ASB) | Rupperswil - Hendschiken - Wohlen - Immensee and Brugg --Hendschiken (ASB) | 1874 to 1882 | - | SCB and NOB (operated by the SCB) | 57 km |
| 3. | Wohlen-Bremgarten Railway (WM) | Sept. 1, 1876 | - | SCB, NOB and Bremgarten municipality (operated by SCB) | 7 km | |
| 4th | Bözbergbahn (BöB) | Pratteln – Stein-Säckingen – Brugg | Aug 2, 1875 | - | SCB and NOB (operated by the NOB) | 48 km |
| Stein-Säckingen-Koblenz | Aug 1, 1892 | 26 km | ||||
| Total | 73 km | |||||
Rolling stock
Since 1859, the SCB designated their locomotives with Capitals: Serie A were fast - and passenger locomotives, Series B h locomotives with a maximum speed of 60 km / C series of freight locomotives and series D, E and F Tender and shunting locomotives . This designation remained in place with the introduction of the nationwide uniform designation system in 1887 , because it was consistent with the newly introduced scheme.
The following locomotives were available to the SCB. The designation valid from 1902 is shown in brackets.
| Series until 1887 |
Series from 1887 |
SCB no. until 1902 |
SBB no. from 1902 |
number | Construction year | Manufacturer | Wheel alignment | v max | discarded | comment | image |
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| A. | A2E ( Eb 2/4 ) | 15-26, 56, 71-74 |
5434-5435 | 17th | 1857-72 | Esslingen | B'2 | 75 | 1893-1904 | Engerth type |
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| A I | B3T (C 3/3) | 101-110 | - | 10 | 1875 | SACM | C. | 60 | 1897-1899 |
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| A II | A3 (Eb 3/5) | 91'-95 ' | 5891-5895 | 5 | 1882-1884 | SCB Olten | 1'C1 ' | 75 | 1904-1908 |
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| - | A3T (B 3/4) | 111-117 | 1461-1467 | 7th | 1887-89 | SCB Olten | 1'C | 75 | 1917 |
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| - | A2 (Eb 2/4) | 141-145 | 5595-5599 | 5 | 1891 | SLM | 2 B | 75 | 1923-1924 |
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| 146-155 | 5481-5490 | 10 | 1893 | SACM | 1915-1933 |
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| 156-160 | 5491-5495 | 5 | 1896 | SLM | 1921-1938 | ||||||
| - | A3T (B 3/4) | 201-210 | 1471-1480 | 15th | 1892 | SACM | 1'C | 75 | 1925 |
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| 211-215 | 1481-1485 | 5 | 1896 | SLM | |||||||
| 216-225 | 1486-1495 | 10 | 1900 | SLM | 1926-28 |
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| - | A2T (A 2/4) | 251-265 | 401-415 | 15th | 1897-1901 | SLM | 2 B | 90 | 1923 | Reconstructed with a four-cylinder compound machine No. 416-420 from SBB |
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| B. | B2E ( Ec 2/5 ) | 1-14, 27-38 |
6995-6999 | 26th | 1854-58 | Esslingen | B'3 | 60 | 1883-1906 | Engerth type |
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| C. | D3E (Ed 3/5) | 39-52 | - | 14th | 1858-1859 | Esslingen | C'2 | 45 | 1894-1900 | Type Engerth No. 55 originally intended for JI |
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| 53-55 | 3 | 1859 | SCB Olten | 1894-1902 | |||||||
| C I | - (E 3/3) | 65-70, 75-78 |
- | 10 | 1871-1873 | Esslingen | C. | 40 | Locomotive No. 100 sold to SLM in 1877. All other locomotives sold to Russia in 1877 were sold to CFR after the Russo-Turkish War |
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| C I | C3 (Ed 3/4) | 65'-69 ' | 7495-7499 | 5 | 1878 | SLM | 1'C | 55 | 1916-1925 |
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| C II | - (Ed 3/3) | 91-100 | - | 14th | 1874-1875 | SACM | C. | 50 | All locomotives sold to Russia in 1877 were sold to CFR after the Russo-Turkish War |
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| C II | C3T (D 3/4) | 96'-100 ', 126-127 |
3891-3897 | 7th | 1885-1890 | SCB Olten | 1'C | 55 | 1913-1916 |
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| - | C4 ( Ed 2 × 2/2 ) | 181-196 | 7681-7696 | 16 | 1891-1893 | Maffei | B + B | 55 | 1910-1938 | Mallet type |
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| D. | B3 (Eb 3/4) | 57-60, 79 | - | 5 | 1864-1873 | SCB Olten | 1'C | 65 | 1892-1893 |
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| - | D4T ( D 2 × 2/2 ) | 169-180 | 4601-4612 | 12 | 1897-1900 | SLM | B + B | 55 | 1923-1926 | Mallet type |
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| E. | D3 ( Ed 3/3 ) | 61-64, 80 | - | 5 | 1868-1873 | SCB Olten | C. | 40 | 1884-1893 |
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| - | E3 ( Ed 3/3 ) | 1-2 | 8398-8399 | 2 | 1876 | SCB Olten | C. | 40 | 1903/04 | Taken over by WB in 1883 |
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| F. | F3 ( E 3/3 ) | 81-90 | 8581-8589 | 10 | 1873-1874 | SLM | C. | 40 | 1886-1917 |
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| - | F3 (E 3/3) | 71'-80 ', 5'-13', 41'-46 ' |
8401-8425 | 25th | 1896-1901 | SLM | C. | 40 | 1936-1945 |
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| - | - ( C 2/3 ) | (4–6) | - | 3 | 1845 | Baldwin & Witney | 1'B | 1864 | 1854 by KWSt.E. accepted |
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Tender locomotive No. 80 "Hagberg", built in 1873 by the SCB, decommissioned in 1893
Freight locomotive D 3/4 No. 97, built in 1885 by the SCB, here as SBB No. 3892
Freight locomotive D 3/4 No. 127, built in 1890 by SCB, later SBB No. 3897
literature
- Placid Weissenbach : The railway system in Switzerland. (PDF 14.8 MB) First part. History of the Railway System. 1913, accessed February 1, 2014 .
- Hans-Peter Bärtschi : Swiss Central Railway (SCB). In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . October 27, 2011 , accessed February 1, 2014 .
- Swiss Central Railway. In: bahndaten.ch. Data on the Swiss railways 1847–1920. Thomas Frey and Hans-Ulrich Schiedt, ViaStoria, accessed on February 1, 2014 .
- Dietler: Swiss Central Railway. In: Röll: Encyclopedia of the Railway System. 1917, accessed February 1, 2014 .
- Hans G. Wägli: Swiss rail network and Swiss rail profile CH + . AS Verlag, Zurich 2010, ISBN 978-3-909111-74-9 . (Text in German and French).
References and comments
- ↑ a b c today Basel SBB
- ↑ a b With the opening of the Neu Solothurn station, the existing station was renamed Alt Solothurn . Today it is called Solothurn West .
- ↑ Photo factum: Riggenbach Hallen, SBB Werkstätten Olten
- ↑ a b today Solothurn
- ^ Report by the Federal Council to the Federal Assembly on its management in 1889. (PDF, 0.4 MB) Justice and Police Department. In: Swiss Federal Gazette. March 1, 1899, p. 411 , accessed November 20, 2013 .
- ↑ Report of the Federal Council to the Federal Assembly on the pardon request of Heinrich Metzger, who was convicted of negligent railroad endangerment, former locomotive driver of the Swiss Nordostbahn, in Seebach near Zurich. (PDF, 0.4 MB) In: Swiss Federal Gazette. June 21, 1902, p. 885 , accessed October 20, 2013 .
- ↑ a b c June 1, 1895 transition from right to left operation
- ↑ a b today Gütsch
- ↑ today siding
- ^ The SBB numbered the locomotives they took over after the boiler overhauls were due.
