Cheb – Oberkotzau railway line

Cheb – Oberkotzau
Asch station, 1903
Route number :	5027
Course book section (DB) :	858
Course book series (SŽDC) :	148
Route length:	54.8 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system :	Cheb – Františkovy Lázně: 25 kV 50 Hz  ~
Top speed:	100 km / h
Legend from Wiesau (Oberpf) from (Vienna–) Plzeň (formerly KFJB ) from Nürnberg Hbf 0.000 Cheb used to be Eger 463 m to Chomutov (formerly BEB ) Egerviadukt (348 m) 70.760 Bk Lehenstein Narrow-gauge railway of the Franzensbader Moorbad 68.750 Františkovy Lázně- Aquaforum since 2007 from Tršnice (formerly BEB ) 6.580 Františkovy Lázně formerly Franzensbad 448 m Abzw pork bags 11.420 to Plauen (Vogtl) ob Bf (formerly K. Sächs. Sts. EB ) 15.700 Vojtanov obec 18,385 Hazlov formerly Haslau 557 m 27,550 Aš ( wedge station ); fr. Asch State Railway Station 640 m to Adorf (Vogtl) (formerly LB Asch – Rossbach) 29,595 State border between the Czech Republic and Germany from Selb city 35.100 Selb-Plößberg 623 m Railway siding of the porcelain factory at Selb Jacob Zeidler station Federal highway 93 37.110 Schönwald (formerly Bf) 609 m Sidings at the Schönwald porcelain factory Federal highway 93 Bundesstrasse 15 Federal highway 93 Perlenbach (70 m) Bundesstrasse 289 46.600 Rehau 525 m 49.860 Wurlitz 507 m from Bamberg and from Weiden 54.800 Oberkotzau ( wedge station ) 484 m to Hof Hbf

The Cheb – Oberkotzau line is a main line in the Czech Republic and Bavaria . It starts in Cheb ( Eger ) and runs over Františkovy Lázně ( Franzensbad ), Aš ( Asch ) and Selb-Plößberg after Oberkotzau . The route was originally planned as a direct rail connection between Eger and Hof , during the implementation of the project the existing Ludwig-Süd-Nord-Bahn was also used between Oberkotzau and Hof .

history

prehistory

As early as 1845, the city of Hof tried to be included in the newly emerging railway network. Above all, a direct connection to the West Bohemian coal mines should be created so that the local industry could be supplied cheaply.

Since the Bavarian state initially did not want to build such a connection itself, they looked for another solution. The city of Hof took out a loan of more than ten million marks from the Royal Bank in Nuremberg and acquired the concession; she entrusted the construction work to the factory owner Theodor von Cramer-Klett . The Bayerische Staatsbahn took over the operation on a lease basis. Because more than half of the railway was on Bohemian territory, a state treaty was necessary between Bavaria and Austria.

construction

simplified elevation profile of the route

Between Eger and Franzensbad, the route of the Saxon line Herlasgrün – Eger ( Voigtland State Railway ), which was built at the same time, was used in parallel. Operationally, both lines in this section remained independent as single-track main lines. From Franzensbad the route was led via Asch, Selb and Rehau to Oberkotzau station , where the line merged with the Ludwig-Süd-Nord-Bahn ( Bamberg – Hof line ). For topographical reasons, the connection could not be made directly to Hof.

The new line was opened on November 1, 1865, and the construction costs amounted to more than six million guilders. After 57 years, the route was to become the property of the Bavarian state free of charge in 1922 after the bank loan was repaid. The annual lease schilling was 279,000 guilders. The transfer of the license was notarized as early as 1919.

business

The ascent from Franzensbad to Asch is so steep that the Bavarian State Railways stationed the heavy Gt 2 × 4/4 Mallet locomotives of the later 96 series as push locomotives in the Eger depot .

Initially, all train traffic from Hof ​​continued southwards in the direction of Regensburg and Munich via the Hof – Eger connection . When the Bavarian State Railway opened the direct route from Hof ​​via Marktredwitz to Regensburg in 1877 , the volume of traffic decreased. However, the line was of outstanding importance for the supply of industry in Hof and the surrounding area with Bohemian coal from the Falkenau basin .

Special stamp for the 125th anniversary of the railway line

Branch of the line in the wedge station Oberkotzau

Rehau station with a LINT 41 multiple unit of the Upper Palatinate Railway

Agilis railcar of the type Regio-Shuttle RS1 in Schönwald

When the company opened there were three pairs of passenger trains a day; in 1914 there were seven. The customs control was carried out at Asch station. Even after the establishment of the Czechoslovak Republic in November 1918, traffic was continued by the Bavarian State Railroad, and from 1920 by the Deutsche Reichsbahn . In 1922 it became the property of the latter in accordance with the contract.

After the Second World War in the left Czechoslovakia stretch lying without compensation to the Czechoslovak State Railways on CSD. On the Cheb – Františkovy Lázně section, no operations were possible due to the destroyed Egerviadukt , and traffic at Hazlov station was also interrupted by the effects of the war. Continuous passenger traffic between Cheb and Hof was not resumed later either. The passenger trains from the direction of Hof now drove to Selber Stadtbahnhof. From then on, the ČSD ran its passenger trains from Asch (since 1945: Aš) via the former Asch – Adorf local railway to Hranice v Čechách ( Roßbach ). For freight traffic, however, the entire route remained in operation, as the porcelain industry in Bavaria was dependent on raw material supplies from Bohemia. The border station was now Selb-Plößberg.

On September 11, 1951, Czech railway workers and opponents of the regime kidnapped a train in Aš and broke through the border with it. The train came to a halt on the German border section before Selb-Plößberg.

At the beginning of the 1970s, the Selb-Plößberg –Land line (–Asch) section of the German section was downgraded to a branch line, before the Rehau – Selb-Plößberg section was also converted into a branch line in the mid-1990s. After that, only the Oberkotzau – Rehau section was operated as a (single-track) main line in Germany, from Rehau to Selb-Plößberg (and on to Selb Stadt) train control was in effect, the train conductor in charge was in Rehau. In the Czech Republic, too, the route between Františkovy Lázně and the border is only shown as a branch line ("regionální dráha") instead of a main line ("celostátní dráha").

During the construction of a bypass road for the city of Selb, the Hof – Eger railway was interrupted on the Bavarian side in the 1990s and the Selb – Plößberg – border section was officially closed on September 29, 1996. Train traffic from Hof ​​via Aš to Cheb was no longer possible. Except for the gap that was torn by the bypass road, the track systems were still completely in place and the connection to the existing lines in both Selb-Plößberg and Asch was still in place, so that once the gap was closed, rail operations were possible again would have been.

In October 2010 the Czech Ministry of Transport announced the intended closure of the Aš border – Aš section, which had not been used for a long time, in December 2010, which was ultimately not implemented.

From around 2010 local politicians called for the cross-border route to be rebuilt in order to relieve the border crossings from heavy truck traffic. During this time in the Czech Republic for Bavaria certain goods were transported to Aš by train and there transferred to trucks. In terms of passenger transport, advocates of the railways mainly rely on a continuous connection from Saalfeld to Cheb via Bad Lobenstein , Naila , Hof , Selb and Aš. This important west-east connection can currently only be traveled by long detours. According to a study, the potential of the direct connection between Hof and Cheb was estimated at 1200 passengers per day with a travel time of 61 minutes and 16 pairs of trains per day.

The Selb-Plößberg station was fundamentally rebuilt and simplified

Route branching in Selb-Plößberg, on the left a multiple unit via Cheb to Marktredwitz , on the right the route to Selb Stadt

Level crossing and former railroad keeper's house in Erkersreuth (August 2012)

On June 5, 2011, a referendum took place in Selb on the participation of the community in the costs. With a participation of 43.23%, 65.72% of the voters voted for the reactivation of the railway line. With the approval, one of the last hurdles for the restart of the route section was overcome. The total cost of the route renewal amounted to 9.5 million euros, with the EU and the federal government bearing the majority of the costs. The local authorities involved had promised a financial contribution of 760,000 euros. The Czech partners also wanted to provide funds from the state infrastructure fund. For the money, the line was upgraded for a maximum speed of 80 km / h and level crossings were technically secured or removed. The station (last only stop) Selb-Plößberg was rebuilt so that the wing of two train parts from the direction of Hof in the direction of Selb and Asch (or the combination of two train parts in the opposite direction) is possible. The Bavarian Railway Company agreed to work with the Czech transport authority Karlovarský kraj to order an hourly service between Selb-Plößberg and Aš from the end of 2013. This order should be awarded to Agilis , which currently offers traffic on the Hof - Selb line. Due to problems with the plan approval procedure, the planned commissioning was delayed until December 2015. The plan approval procedure was submitted to the government of Upper Franconia by Deutsche Bahn in spring 2014.

In January 2012, the decommissioning procedure initiated in 2010 was lifted on the Czech side. On January 26, 2015, work began at Aš station to reactivate the railway line on the approximately 2-kilometer section on the Czech side. Among other things, new drainage systems will be installed at the Aš train station and the platforms and safety equipment of the train station will be modernized to the latest technology. The cost of the work is around 75 million crowns (2.75 million euros) and should be completed according to plan in June 2015, around the same time as the planned start of renovation and construction on the German section of the still disused route.

Work on reactivating the line on the German section began around Easter 2015. In addition to the construction of three bridges, the entire superstructure and substructure were renewed and the Selb-Plößberg station was rebuilt and modernized as a branch station. A new electronic signal box (ESTW) was built in Rehau station to control the route . The level crossings have also been partially modernized. The Rehau – Selb-Plößberg – Selb Stadt section was completely closed to construction work from August to the beginning of December. On December 2, 2015, the line was put back into operation.

Since the timetable change on December 13, 2015, in addition to the existing hourly service between Hof and Selb Stadt, which is operated by Agilis, nine continuous pairs of passenger trains of the Upper Palatinate Railway have been operating as line OPB2 every two hours between Hof Hbf and Cheb in the Czech Republic, almost all of them to and from Marktredwitz be tied through. Sometimes individual trains run in the sections Cheb – Aš město and Hof Hbf – Aš město. RegioShuttle or LINT 41 diesel multiple units are used across borders on the OPB2 line . So far, around 150 passengers per day use the reactivated cross-border section.

Operating points

Cheb ⊙

Cheb train station

→ Main article : Cheb train station

The station was built in 1865 as a joint station between the Actiengesellschaft der Bavarian Eastern Railways , the Royal Bavarian State Railways and the Voigtland State Railroad . The station was built by the Royal Bavarian State Railways. In 1870 the BEB was added with the Chomutov – Cheb railway , in 1872 the Kaiser Franz-Josephs-Bahn with the Pilsen – Eger railway and in 1881 the Nuremberg – Eger railway . Each railway company had its own facilities and buildings in the station, for example there were four different locomotive sheds. Numerous special regulations between the individual companies somewhat simplified the complicated operation at the community station. Due to the regulations after the Second World War, the respective state had to take over the operational management on its territory, the special status of the station with the operational management by the Deutsche Reichsbahn ended. The Československé státní dráhy took over the station in 1946.

Františkovy Lázně-Aquaforum ⊙

The Františkovy Lázně-Aquaforum stop has only existed since 2007. It was set up after the stretch of the Františkovy Lázně – Cheb section was renovated and serves to improve the development of the spa facilities. This stop is a need stop.

Františkovy Lázně ⊙

Františkovy Lázně Railway Station (2008)

When the line was opened, the Franzensbad station had five continuous tracks and 30 points. The Buschtěhrad Railway (BEB) opened the Tirschnitz – Franzensbad railway line in 1871 , increasing the importance of the now enlarged Franzensbad railway station. The station has remained essentially unchanged from around 1900 until today. A project planned in the 1910s to relocate the goods outside the city was not implemented. Only the station entrances were adapted to the new security technology and, with the electrification, the form signals were exchanged for light signals.

Branch pork bag ⊙

After the Sudetenland was annexed to Germany in October 1938, the pork bag junction was set up to link it to the Plauen – Eger line. It consisted of a signal box that served the track connection between the line to Plauen and the Cheb – Oberkotzau line, and two platforms for the staff. In 1945, the ČSD rebuilt the track connection between the two lines and closed the operations center. The signal box building was also demolished, only a memorial stone that was erected in 1938 on the occasion of the route expansion remains.

Vojtanov obec ⊙

Although the municipality of Voitersreuth tried to find a train station, it only got a train station on the route to Herlasgrün. The Bavarian State Railways did not want to build a station in the steep section. It was only after the Second World War that ČSD opened the Vojtanov stop (today Vojtanov obec stop). This stop is a need stop.

Aš ⊙

Aš station (2015)

The Aš station (formerly Asch station, Asch Bayerischer Bf, Asch Reichsbahnhof or Asch State Station) was opened as a border station. During the construction of the Asch – Rossbach local line, the Asch – Rossbach local line set up a small own station not far from the state train station. At the end of the Second World War, the imposing reception building of the state train station was damaged by looting. It was blown up in December 1968 and a new building was completed in 1971.

It is planned to replace the reception building from 1971 with a smaller new building by 2022. With a budget of 80 million crowns, the environment is also to be redesigned and a new bus terminal is to be built.

Oberkotzau ⊙

Oberkotzau station , platform on the line to Cheb

→ Main article : Oberkotzau train station

The wedge station Oberkotzau is the separation station for the Bamberg – Hof , Weiden – Oberkotzau and Cheb – Oberkotzau railway lines.

literature

• Zdeněk Hudec u. a .: Atlas drah České Republiky 2006–2007 . 2nd Edition. Pavel Malkus Publishing House, Prague 2006, ISBN 80-87047-00-1 .
• Hans Kundmann: Eger once - Schirnding today. Border stations of the Fichtelgebirgsbahn . Publisher: MEC Model Eisenbahnclub / Hofer Eisenbahnfreunde eV, Hof 1983.
• Arthur von Mayer: History and geography of the German railways . Baensch, Berlin 1891 (reprint: Steiger, Moers 1984, ISBN 3-921564-71-9 ).
• NN: Better connection between Bavaria and the Czech Republic . In: Eisenbahn-Revue International 2/2016, p. 100f.

Web links

Commons : Cheb – Oberkotzau railway line  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Timetable 1944/45: Route 422a
• MuEC Selb / Rehau: Selb-Plößberg-Asch section ( Memento from October 7, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
• Cheb – Hranice v Čechách on www.zelpage.cz
• Timetable 2018

Individual evidence

1. ↑ : Markéta Kachlíkova completed construction work on the Czech section of the railway line between Aš and Selb. In: radio.cz , July 19, 2015. Accessed October 24, 2018.
2. ↑ Current information on www.zelpage.cz - accessed on October 21, 2010
3. ↑ Railway line from Upper Franconia to the Czech Republic is reactivated, nordbayerischer-kurier.de, June 6, 2011 ( Memento from January 9, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
4. ↑ http://www.hoellentalbahn.net/Pl-As.htm
5. ↑ Der Neue Tag - Edition of September 11, 2010, page 3, “New Passengers on the Old Railway Line” Z17ff, publisher: Der Neue Tag, Weigelstr. 16, 92637 Weiden
6. ↑ Nordbayerischer Kurier from June 6, 2011 Railway line from Upper Franconia to the Czech Republic is reactivated , accessed on June 9, 2011 ( Memento from January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
7. ↑ Selb-Asch railway line will be reactivated by the end of 2013. Regional Planning Association Upper Franconia-East, November 24, 2011, accessed on December 30, 2011 . 
8. ↑ Press release DB AG "Reactivation of the Selb-Plößberg - Aš railway line", December 19, 2013, accessed on January 2, 2014 ( Memento from January 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
9. ^ Government of Upper Franconia: Plan approval documents reactivation of the section Aš (DB border) - Selb-Plößberg , accessed on August 29, 2014
10. ^ Eisenbahn-magazin 3/2012, p. 21
11. ↑ Frankenpost: Ascher are already expanding the tracks , March 20, 2015. Page 15.
12. ↑ DB annual timetable for 2016
13. ↑ ČD annual timetable 2016 ( memo from November 6, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
14. ↑ 150 passengers a day. In: Frankenpost. April 6, 2018, accessed April 30, 2018 . 
15. ↑ Wilfried Rettig: Plauen / V – Cheb (Eger) - The PE railway line in the Euregio-Egrensis , p. 47
16. ↑ Wilfried Rettig: Plauen / V – Cheb (Eger) - The PE railway line in the Euregio-Egrensis , Verlag Jacobi, Fraureuth 2007, ISBN 978-3-937228-01-3 , p. 8
17. ↑ "Stanice Aš získá novou výpravní budovu, stará půjde k zemi" on zdopravy.cz