Küstrin-Kietz – Frankfurt (Oder) railway line
| Küstrin-Kietz – Frankfurt (Oder) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Route number : | 6523 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Course book section (DB) : | DB ex 206.62 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Route length: | 28.7 km | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gauge : | 1435 mm ( standard gauge ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Küstrin-Kietz – Frankfurt (Oder) railway was a predominantly double-track main line in Brandenburg. After 1945 it was operated as a single-track branch line. In 2000 the line was closed.
history
From the beginning until 1945
In the middle of the 19th century there was a need for the most direct connection possible from Berlin to East Prussia . On October 12, 1857, the Prussian Eastern Railway opened its connection from Frankfurt (Oder) via Küstrin (until 1929 Cüstrin ) and Landsberg (Warthe) to Kreuz on the Stettin – Posen route and at the same time the Dirschau – Marienburg section. This created a direct connection to East Prussia via the Lower Silesian-Märkische Eisenbahn from Berlin. Intermediate stations on the Frankfurt – Cüstrin section were created in Lebus and Podelzig.
In 1867 the line from Berlin via Strausberg to Cüstrin was put into operation. This reduced the importance of the old route to Frankfurt (Oder), as from then on the through traffic took the shorter route via Strausberg.
The line was given new tasks when the Breslau – Stettin line was built from 1874 to 1877 and at the same time a connection from Cottbus to Frankfurt was established. This created a continuous north-south relationship from the Baltic Sea with the Szczecin port to Saxony.
Between 1910 and 1917 a large marshalling yard was built in the north-west of Frankfurt. He could not be reached directly from the route from Küstrin. Therefore, a connection was built that began south of Lebus at the Kunersdorf desert junction and led to Boossen station on the Eberswalde – Frankfurt (Oder) railway , which in this area ran almost parallel to the Küstriner line. Since then, the direct route via Grube Vaterland has only been used for passenger traffic and has remained single-track; the new connection was expanded to double-track in the 1920s.
In the 1930s there was a dense supply of trains with around ten pairs of passenger trains a day. In addition, there were three pairs of express trains, most of which were tied to Dresden or Breslau – Beuthen on the one hand, and Stettin on the other.
Development from 1945
In 1945 the region was the scene of fierce fighting between the German Wehrmacht and the Red Army. Several station buildings were destroyed. The route also suffered severe damage. The Podelzig – Küstrin-Kietz section was rebuilt in sections by 1950. The second track of the line went to the Soviet Union as a reparation payment , as did the rails of the direct connection to Frankfurt. The only remaining route was via Boossen. In addition, due to the close border with Poland, the traffic importance of the route decreased significantly. The Kietz / Kostrzyn border crossing was only used for goods traffic. The line has been downgraded to a branch line.
In the 1970s and 1980s, there were around four to five pairs of trains a day in both passenger and freight traffic. A connecting curve had been set up at Kietz for freight and military traffic, with which direct journeys on the Ostbahn towards Berlin were possible. Military lines were also built on the Oder near Neu Manschnow and opposite on the Polish side. In the event of war, these should be connected via a pioneer bridge, thus enabling the bypassing of the Oder bridge.
On the night of June 26th to 27th, 1977 a serious train accident occurred in Lebus. The cause was on the one hand the mistake of a switchman in Boossen. In addition, there was the insufficient security level of the station. The express train D in 1918 to Stralsund, which was supposed to travel via Eberswalde, was instead directed in Boossen towards Kietz and collided with a freight train at the Lebus stop. 29 people were killed.
After the political change in the GDR, the border at Kostrzyn was reopened to passenger traffic in 1993. The trains from Frankfurt (Oder) also went directly to the Küstrin station, eventually even every two hours. Nevertheless, the occupancy rate remained low, as the demand from Poland was oriented more towards Berlin and otherwise only a few larger places were on the route. On June 1, 1996, passenger traffic was discontinued. There was also no significant use in freight transport.
On September 1, 2000, the Federal Railway Authority approved the closure of the line, which was completed on November 9 of the same year. In the meantime, parts of the route have been dismantled.
Train stations
Küstrin-Kietz (formerly Kietz , Cüstrin Lange Vorstadt )
The original Cüstrin station was the later Küstrin Altstadt station on the west side of the Oder. Today's Kostrzyn station was built with the Breslau – Stettin railway line in 1876 and was initially called Cüstriner Vorstadt, and only since 1904 Cüstrin (Neustadt) Hbf. With the construction of the connection to Stettin, the importance of the connection in freight traffic grew. It was therefore necessary to build a station at the junction of the lines to Strausberg and Frankfurt, initially serving purely operational purposes. From 1882 at the latest, it was also used for passenger transport, initially under the name Kietz, and from 1904 onwards Cüstrin Kietz . The station building was destroyed in the Second World War and rebuilt around 1950. During the GDR era, the station was renamed Kietz in order to avoid associations with the core city now in Poland and now called Kostrzyn. Due to its tasks in the border clearance in freight traffic, a significant expansion took place. Created as a wedge station , it later became the Inselbahnhof through the construction of a connecting track from Berlin to the Frankfurt side . Today the station is only in operation for trains on the Berlin – Kostrzyn route; the platform to Frankfurt has been declared a company site and is fenced in.
New Manschnow
Stop built around 1950. Neu Manschow as well as Reitwein, Podelzig and Lebus were in operation until passenger traffic was discontinued in 1996.
Riding wine
Railway station, furnished in 1879. Unoccupied for a long time during the GDR era.
Podgy
Railway station, opened when the line was built in 1857. The station building was destroyed and rebuilt in World War II. After the Second World War, the only remaining crossing point on the route. At the end of the 1980s, the station was equipped with Soviet EZMG signals.
Lebus
Railway station, opened when the line was built in 1857. The station building was demolished after being destroyed in the war and replaced by a barrack. During the GDR era, the station was unoccupied for a long time and in the end it was just a stop.
Booze
Kliestow (district of Lebus) (formerly Grube Vaterland )
Since the 1880s there has been a goods loading point for open-cast lignite mining. In 1900 it was replaced by a stop for passenger traffic. At the station there was a connection to the Frankfurt freight railway. The station was on the section that was dismantled in 1945 as a reparation payment.
Frankfurt (Oder)
literature
- Lothar Meyer, Horst Regling: Railway junction Frankfurt / Oder. The gateway to the east . Transpress 2002, ISBN 978-3-613-71126-6 .
- Bernd Kuhlmann: Railways across the Oder-Neisse border. Ritzau, Pürgen 2004. ISBN 3-935101-06-6 .
Web links
- Information on the history of the station and the train accident in the Lebuser Heimatlexikon
- Prussian Ostbahn on bahnstrecken.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Lothar Meyer, 150 years of Ostbahn, see here ( page no longer available , search in web archives )
- ↑ various course books