Bebra – Fulda railway line
The Bebra – Fulda line is a double-track and electrified main line in Hesse .
It was built as part of the Bebra-Hanauer-Bahn or Kurhessische Staatsbahn , which merged with the Frankfurt-Bebraer Eisenbahn after the Prussian annexation of Kurhessen .
During the time of the division of Germany , it was part of the north-south route , the most important and busiest connection of the former German Federal Railroad between north and south Germany. Today it is also known as the Fulda Valley Railway , together with the Bebra – Baunatal – Guntershausen line .
history
The construction of the line began in the station Bebra the Hessian Friedrich-Wilhelms-North Railroad Company (railway line Kassel-Gerstungen). On January 22, 1866, the first section to Bad Hersfeld was completed. The opening of the second section via Hünfeld to Fulda followed in the same year on October 1, 1866.
As part of the Fulda – Erfurt axis, the route is to be upgraded for the use of the eddy current brake ( ICE 3 ) by the end of 2017 .
In 2018, DB Netz built electronic interlockings in Bad Hersfeld and Haunetal-Neukirchen. On March 25, 2019, the ESTW Haunetal, with operator station in Bad Hersfeld, went into operation. It controls an approximately 25 km long section between Mecklar and Burghaun.
Route
From Bebra, the route initially follows the Fulda valley . In Bad Hersfeld, the route then swings into the Haune valley . This track alignment has been chosen to Kurhessisches territory not to leave, since the time of the track construction is a part of the valley of the Fulda the Grand Duchy of Hesse belonged. On the way to Fulda, the ridge between the two river valleys had to be overcome in an elaborate route with fifty meters of lost slope and the Burghauner tunnel .
Level crossings
There are currently seven level crossings on this route.
North of Bad Hersfeld there are two level crossings (Reilos and Friedlos). Both were converted to EBÜT systems. The other level crossings south of Bad Hersfeld are all guarded.
- Reilos (EBÜT system)
- Friedlos, landfill (EBÜT facility)
- Call barrier between Bad Hersfeld and Unterhaun
- Unterhaun (Item 149) - abandoned
- Oberhaun, train station (full electric barriers)
- L 3471 / B 27 near Haunetal Wehrda (also with traffic lights)
- Hünfeld Breitzbacher Weg and Haunstraße (both mechanical full barriers via signal box)
It is planned to replace the crossings in Oberhaun and Unterhaun with road bridges. The reasons are not only the long waiting times due to the high traffic, but also the bridges over the Haune are to be replaced by new buildings, because z. B. the Haunebrücke in Hauneck-Unterhaun can only accommodate vehicles up to nine tons and is also very narrow.
Since 2012, the Haunstraße level crossing in Hünfeld has been replaced by a pedestrian underpass with the station renovation. The call barrier at Unterhaun has since been abandoned without replacement. In the end, only four level crossings between Bebra and Fulda remain.
service
Up until the Second World War , the route was mainly used by Frankfurt am Main - Leipzig traffic . The division of Germany made this connection less important. Only the transit trains to Berlin and the interzonal trains still used this route in long-distance traffic - with a change of locomotive and direction of travel in Bebra, as the Berlin curve in front of Bebra station , which had bypassed this station, allowed direct travel to the east to be closed. However, traffic between Frankfurt and Hanover increased significantly. In the south, the connection to Bavaria via the Flieden – Gemünden line became increasingly important. The Bebra – Fulda line became part of the north-south line of the former Federal Railroad . In 1963 the line was electrified.
With the fall of the inner-German border in 1989 and the opening of the high-speed line from Hanover to Würzburg in 1991, the situation changed again. When it opened, the Fulda – Bebra connection lost the InterCity trains that ran between Hanover on the one hand and Frankfurt am Main and Würzburg on the other. The east-west long-distance traffic has been run every 120 minutes with Intercity since 1992 and additionally since 2000 with ICE on the Dresden – Leipzig – Eisenach – Erfurt –Frankfurt line and individual Intercity as booster trains.
After the opening of the Hanover – Würzburg high-speed line, mainly freight trains and long-distance services on the Frankfurt – Erfurt – Leipzig – Dresden line ran on the route . Since the 2017/2018 timetable change and the new Erfurt – Leipzig / Halle line went into operation, the ICE line 11 has also been running on schedule from Munich via Stuttgart, Mannheim, Frankfurt, Fulda, Erfurt, Leipzig to Berlin and Hamburg on the Fulda – Bebra and branches off at the Berlin curve onto the Thuringian Railway. There is also night train traffic on the route with the NightJet trains operated by ÖBB and the Paris - Moscow night train .
Local transport has been operated by cantus Verkehrsgesellschaft since December 10, 2006 . The RB5 line of the North Hessian Transport Association (NVV) runs every hour between Fulda and Kassel, and individual journeys on the RB7 line (Göttingen – Bebra) run extended from / to Bad Hersfeld or Fulda. Two pairs of regional express trains operated by DB Regio travel from Bebra to Frankfurt and back in rush hour .
In freight traffic, however, the route is still part of the north-south axis and there is still heavy traffic. Trains of combined cargo traffic and car transport trains predominate here.
outlook
With the opening of the Erfurt – Halle (Saale) / Leipzig high-speed line, the route and travel time on the route from Frankfurt (Main) to Berlin can be shortened by guided tours via Erfurt and Leipzig, compared to the route via Kassel and Braunschweig. At the same time, the Fulda – Bebra route is largely used by freight trains, regional and long-distance traffic with more than 300 trains a day. Therefore, the construction of a relief route has been classified as part of the urgent need in the Federal Transport Infrastructure Plan 2030 . As part of the associated planning process, spatial planning for the course of a relief section has been running since mid-2018, which enables a direct connection from Fulda to the Thuringian Railway near Gerstungen. A point in time for the commissioning of the new line cannot yet be foreseen.
gallery
Platform in Bebra train station , early 1990s
Guard-operated level crossing, Oberhaun operations center
ICE on the guard-operated Hünfeld level crossing
Entrance building of the Fulda train station
Web links
- Course, operating points and some permissible speeds of the route on the OpenRailwayMap .
Individual evidence
- ↑ DB Netze - Infrastructure Register
- ↑ Railway Atlas Germany . 9th edition. Schweers + Wall, Aachen 2014, ISBN 978-3-89494-145-1 .
- ^ André Daubitz, Frank de Gavarelli, Marcus Schenkel: A major project on the home straight - the new line between Erfurt and Leipzig / Halle . In: Railway technical review . tape 64 , no. 12 , 2015, ISSN 0013-2845 , p. 33-42 .
- ↑ Haunetal ESTW construction project. In: BauInfoPortal of Deutsche Bahn. Retrieved November 8, 2018 .
- ^ KBS 610 Fulda - Kassel . In: turntable . No. 295 , 2019, ISSN 0934-2230 , ZDB -ID 1283841-X , p. 81 .
- ^ Wolfgang Klee: North-South. A main route through the ages , Motorbuch Verlag Stuttgart 1990, chapter Bebra-Elm , page 65ff
- ↑ Why the project is so important. In: fulda-gerstungen.de. DB Netz, accessed on June 16, 2018 .
- ↑ Schedule. In: fulda-gerstungen.de. DB Netz, accessed on June 16, 2018 .