Amstetten – Laichingen railway line
| Amstetten-Laichingen | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Route number (DB) : | 9471 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Course book section (DB) : | 12759, ex 905 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Route length: | 18.96 km still in operation: 5.73 km |
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| Gauge : | 1000 mm ( meter gauge ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Minimum radius : | 140 m | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Amstetten – Laichingen railway is an 18.96-kilometer, meter- gauge, narrow - gauge railway on the Swabian Alb . It begins at the Amstetten connection station with a connection to the Filstalbahn and runs in a south-westerly direction to Oppingen . From there it originally led via Nellingen and Merklingen to Laichingen . Today the offer Ulm Railway Society (UEF) on the 5.73 km-long section Amstetten-Oppingen a museum train traffic to, it is under the name Albbähnle marketed. The rest of the route is closed and dismantled.
history
The line was opened on October 20, 1901 by the Württembergische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (WEG). In freight transport were dollies used standard gauge freight cars using a dolly pit on biaxial rolling stool to push.
The WEG ceased passenger traffic on August 31, 1985 and goods traffic on September 14, 1985. Only the section to Oppingen was not dismantled. The rest of the route was completely dismantled and its course can no longer be seen for the most part. The station building and the depot, which was modernized in 1981 , still exist in Laichingen . The latter also served as a workshop and is now used as a bus garage. Its right part is the original steam engine shed from 1901. The Nellingen station building was demolished in 2013.
Vehicle use
Operation was opened with three three -axle steam locomotives ( 1s – 3s ) built at Borsig in Berlin , five passenger cars, one mixed pack / mail car and 18 freight cars. Diesel multiple units were used from the mid-1950s . The first railcar was a converted bus from Hanover, in which the steering was blocked and railway wheels were installed. It was designated as WEG T35 and retired in 1968 after an accident and a broken axle. Its successor was also known as the T35 and drove on the track from 1968 to 1976. In 1956, two railcars from the Wismar wagon factory came from Kleinbahn Bremen – Tarmstedt . The larger one was converted into a tow car and called the T34 . The smaller one only served as a spare parts dispenser. In 1973 two railcars came from the Härtsfeldbahn, which had recently been discontinued, to Laichingen, WEG T30 and T31 . These two railcars were four-axle and four-engine examples from the Fuchs wagon factory in Heidelberg. The railcars also served freight. In addition, the MAN T37 also came from the Härtsfeldbahn to the Laichingen route; this loner was based on the two-axle and standard-gauge MAN rail buses .
Since 1990, steam and diesel trains operated by Ulm Railroad Friends have been running regularly on the remaining section. The locomotive 99 7203 , which was originally used on the Mosbach – Mudau railway line and was later used as a construction locomotive on the Albtalbahn , and a former FAUR L18H-C industrial diesel locomotive . A further narrow gauge - Diesel type O & K MV8 the former Wandsbeker industrial railway waits for a general inspection . The former Laichinger steam locomotive 2s returned from the vehicle museum in Marxzell and has been in Amstetten since 2002. It was disassembled into assemblies there in 2009.
On the slope between Amstetten and Oppingen
Shortly before the Oppingen train station
Locomotive 99 7203
literature
- Ludger Kenning: The Amstetten – Laichingen narrow-gauge railway. Kenning Verlag, Nordhorn 2002, secondary line documentation 73. ISBN 3-933613-48-5
- Hans-Joachim Knupfer: Narrow gauge to Laichingen. The history of the Alb railway Amstetten - Laichingen. Bleiweis, Schweinfurt 2002, ISBN 3-928786-87-3
- The large archive of the railway lines in Germany , GeraMond-Verlag
