Arth Rigi Railway

0.0	Arth
	Kirchfeld
	court
	field
	Schöntal
	factory
1.4	Oberarth
	Mühlefluhtunnel
	Mountain road
	Mountain road
	Harmettlen

3.0	Arth-Goldau (Bahnhofplatz) 1892–1897 519 m above sea level M.

0.0	Arth-Goldau (high platform) 519 m above sea level M.
	Connecting track from the SBB train station
	Goldau depot
	Goldau Eichmatt 1875–1892 and 2010–2017

0.6	Goldau A4	543 m above sea level M.
2.1	Crawl	759 m above sea level M.
	Rothenfluhtunnel (67 m)
4.2	Fruttli	1152 m above sea level M.
	Federnwald tunnel (48 m)
5.8	Rigi Klösterli	1315 m above sea level M.
6.8	Rigi Wölferstschen-First	1484 m above sea level M.
	Vitznau-Rigi-Bahn from Vitznau
7.7	Rigi Staffel	1603 m above sea level M.
8.5	Rigi Kulm	1752 m above sea level M.

The Arth-Rigi line ( ARB ) is a Swiss standard gauge - cog railway which of Arth-Goldau to Rigi leads. Together with the Vitznau-Rigi-Bahn (VRB), which reaches the mountain from the other side, it has formed the Rigi-Bahnen AG (RB) company since 1992 .

history

When the Schwyz citizens heard of Arth that a railway was to be built on the Rigi from the Lucerne side, they received the concession for the Schwyz route between Staffelhöhe and Rigi Kulm, as well as between Arth, Oberarth and Kulm, from the Schwyz Cantonal Council in 1870. They commissioned the two engineers Zschokke and Riggenbach to build the same. Arther Aktiengesellschaft immediately started building the Staffelhöhe to Rigi Kulm ( 1752 m above sea level ). In the summer of 1873 the disused Lucerne Vitznau-Rigi-Bahn took over this route and until the merger in 1992 had to pay a rent for the use of the Staffelhöhe – Rigi Kulm rail line.

Share for CHF 500 in Arther Rigibahn-Gesellschaft dated March 28, 1873

Kulm station of the Arth-Rigi-Bahn (rack railway)

Former track of the valley railway: supporting structure of the first Rigiaabrücke

In 1873 the track construction from Goldau ( 518 m above sea level ) via Kräbel and Klösterli ( 1315 m above sea level ) to the Staffel began and in 1874 the section Arth-Oberarth-Goldau was tackled. On June 4, 1875, the Arth-Rigi Railway was able to start operating along the entire route. It had lost the race against the Vitznau-Rigi-Bahn, but it shone with the wonderful view on the route and with the more luxurious cars. In 1928 the mountain railway also started winter operations between Goldau and Rigi-Kulm.

The standard-gauge line originally began in Arth on the banks of Lake Zug . This valley railway, an adhesion railway, going to the Arth-Goldau station, was separated from the rack railway in 1881 and run separately, but a track connection was retained. In 1959, this branch was shut down and the track system dismantled. With a gradient of 66 ‰, the line was one of the steepest standard-gauge railways in Switzerland.

On October 20, 1885, after a broken axle, a train crashed below the Kräbel station over the embankment. The train driver lost his life and nine people were injured. → Section accident of the H 1/2 4 and conversion in article ARB H 1/2

Initially, most of the passengers traveled to Lake Zug by ship. From 1882 the platforms of the ARB were parallel to those of the Gotthardbahn on the station forecourt. However, when the latter required more and more space for the Zug route in 1897, the ARB created the characteristic wrought-iron high platform that ran across the tracks. Now the majority of ARB passengers traveled by train. From 2011 to 2013, a new, double-track railway station was built in front of the high platform, and the listed platform was converted into an entrance hall. Originally, the introduction of a new train station parallel to the SBB line was also considered, but this had to be discarded because the SBB needed more space in this area due to the NEAT.

On May 1, 1907, the ARB was converted to electric traction as the world's first standard-gauge rack railway. The valley station of the aerial cableway to Rigi Scheidegg ( 1568 m above sea level ) is located in the Kräbel , and was previously reached by the narrow-gauge Rigi-Kaltbad-Scheidegg-Bahn (RSB), which was broken off in 1942 .

On June 3, 2000, the Arth-Rigi-Bahn celebrated its 125th anniversary with a steam festival.

View from the hall in the former high platform onto the platform area with a train ready to depart

On the night of January 19-20, 2014, the high platform at Arth-Goldau station was raised by two meters so that it could be renovated on site. After this renovation, it was lowered again by 1.3 m. In July 2017, the new station concourse in the high platform went into operation and the temporary stops were closed. In the same year, the rectifier system in Klösterli was replaced by a more modern, higher output.

Electrical system

Systems for electrical operation:	2 rectifier stations
Three-phase supply:	15 kV / 50 Hz
Traction energy direct current:	1 '500 V
Rectifier station performance:	3 '550 kW

speed

electr. Locomotives on the ascent:	21 km / h
Descent (0–144 ‰):	17 km / h
Descent (145–200 ‰):	14 km / h
Travel time Goldau – Rigi Kulm:	35 minutes
Capacity:	1,000 people / h

Rolling stock

BCFhe 2/3 ARB railcar No. 6, Rigi Staffel

4 electric shuttle trains 508 kW (No. 11-14)
1 electric shuttle train 824 kW (No. 15)
1 electric railcar 390 kW (No. 6) , test run: August 30, 1911 , oldest still operational electric rack-and-pinion railcar in the world, last general overhaul: 1990
1 electric railcar 448 kW (No. 7)
1 electric locomotive with electric snow blower 448 kW (No. 8)
4 passenger cars
10 freight wagons, company vehicles, snow plow, etc.

Former rolling stock

H 1/2 , the cogwheel steam locomotives for the mountain route
E 3/3 No. 11 , the steam locomotive for the valley section

Trivia

A rascal prank was carried out on the last trip on the valley railway in 1959 : At the Harmettlen stop, the tracks were rubbed with grease so that the trip had to be ended there.
The Mühlefluhtunnel the roller coaster was up to his recruitment with a height of about 6 meters the highest railway tunnel in Europe.
For several years now there have been repeated considerations to replace the ARB with a cable car.

literature

Florian Inäbnit: Rigi-Bahnen; Arth – Rigi cog railway . Prellbock Druck & Verlag, Leissigen 2000, ISBN 3-907579-18-6 .
Sandro Sigrist: Arth – Goldau valley railway . Prellbock Druck & Verlag, Leissigen 1998, ISBN 3-907579-08-9 .

Tower station with high platform of the Arth-Rigi-Bahn in Arth-Goldau

Web links

Commons : Arth-Rigi-Bahn - collection of images, videos and audio files

Rigi-Bahnen AG
Arth-Rigi-Bahn on the ETHorama platform

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b ^c Arth - Rigi Bahn (ARB). Arth am See - Arth-Goldau In: discontinued-bahnen.ch by Jürg Ehrbar, accessed on June 13, 2020
^ Walter Trüb: The steepest railways in Switzerland . In: Railway amateur . No. 9 , 1955, pp. 276 .
↑ Raising the Rigi-Bahn-Hochperrons went smoothly

47.048611111111 8.5477777777778Coordinates: 47 ° 2 ′ 55 " N , 8 ° 32 ′ 52" E ; CH1903: six hundred and eighty-four thousand two hundred seventy-nine / 211437

[E-1] Arth - Rigi Bahn (ARB). Arth am See - Arth-Goldau In: discontinued-bahnen.ch by Jürg Ehrbar, accessed on June 13, 2020

[2] Walter Trüb: The steepest railways in Switzerland . In: Railway amateur . No. 9 , 1955, pp. 276 .

[3] Raising the Rigi-Bahn-Hochperrons went smoothly