Railway line from Meckesheim to Neckarelz

	Elsenz Valley Railway from Neckargemünd
19,800	Meckesheim	141 m
	Elsenz Valley Railway to Bad Friedrichshall
	Bundesstrasse 45
20,936	Elsenz
22,485	Schwarzbach
24.610	Epfenbach
24.884	Eschelbronn (previously Bf; since 1876)	154 m
26.737	Neidenstein (previously Bf)	157 m
30.060	Waibstadt	166 m
31.400	Neckarbischofsheim (1887–1902)
31,919	Bundesstrasse 292
32.038	Neckarbischofsheim North (Bft)	172 m
	Krebsbachtalbahn to Hüffenhardt
32.986	Schwarzbach
34.841	Helmstadt (Baden) (previously Bf)	178 m
34.890	Wollenbach
38.917	Aglasterhausen (previously Bf)	206 m
39.300	Daudenzell (from approx. 1955)	218 m
	Asbach
42.530	Asbach (Baden)	240 m
	Mörtelsteiner Tunnel (690 m)
44.000	Mortar stone (since Nov. 1908)	220 m
	Erlesrain tunnel (98 m)
46.850	Obrigheim	181 m
49.100	Finkenhof
49.100	Kalksberg Tunnel (285 m)

	Connection of Finkenhof / armaments factory “Goldfisch” 1944–1945

49.400	Neckar bridge (approx. 310 m)
50.000	Neckarelz (until 1879)	155 m
50.600	Neckar Valley Railway from Bad Friedrichshall
	old route of the Odenwaldbahn (until 1895)
	Mosbacher connecting arch (until approx. 1960)
	Route from Osterburken
51.850	Mosbach-Neckarelz (since 1879)	154 m
	Neckar Valley Railway to Heidelberg

The Meckesheim – Neckarelz railway line is a single-track, electrified branch line running in North Baden from Meckesheim to Aglasterhausen , which used to lead to Neckarelz . It was part of the former Badische Odenwaldbahn Heidelberg – Würzburg, ie main line, which is why its route was planned to be double-track. The part of the line that still exists today is also known as the Schwarzbachtalbahn .

geography

topography

The railway line runs in the border area between the Kleiner Odenwald and the Kraichgau . Since the transition between these two landscapes is fluid, the railway line is regarded in the literature as both the Kraichgau and the Odenwald route.

Today's route got its name Schwarzbachtalbahn because it follows the Schwarzbach , a right tributary of the Elsenz , to the current end of the route. The DB course book does not use this name, but it is now in use.

Because it runs consistently in the valley between Meckesheim and Aglasterhausen, this section of the route does not have any major engineering structures. In the now disused section between Aglasterhausen and Neckarelz, the topographical conditions were much more difficult, which is why a total of three tunnels were built there. The naming of the so-called Kalksberg tunnel is curious; the official name is not derived from a "Kalksberg", rather the crossed elevation is called Karlsberg.

There are only two bridges longer than twenty meters on the stretch of road that remains today. One crosses the Elsenz between Meckesheim and Eschelbronn . The other bridges the federal highway 292 between Waibstadt and Neckarbischofsheim Nord . By far the largest bridge structure was once the Neckar Bridge between Obrigheim and Neckarelz, which was blown up in 1945.

Stations and administrative affiliation

Waibstadt station, reception building (Apr. 2007)

The section still remaining today leads past relatively large towns, the train stations of which are conveniently located for the respective town center, with the exception of Neckarbischofsheim Nord train station . Between Aglasterhausen and Neckarelz, on the other hand, apart from Obrigheim, whose train station was now very far from the town, only very small villages were served. That is why that section of the route was only used to a low degree, which ultimately led to its closure.

From the Neckarbischofsheim Nord station mentioned , the Krebsbachtalbahn branches off to Hüffenhardt. However, this train station is not at all in the area of the eponymous Neckarbischofsheim, but three kilometers away from this small town on the area of the neighboring town of Waibstadt in its Bernau district.

With the administrative reform in Baden-Württemberg, some localities and districts changed. Before all the places along the route were independent communities, today this only applies to some. The places along the remaining section of the route are still all independent municipalities, with the exception of Helmstadt, which was merged with a few neighboring municipalities to form the new municipality of Helmstadt-Bargen . On the now disused section of the route, however, Daudenzell became a district of Aglasterhausen, Asbach and Mörtelstein were incorporated into Obrigheim and Neckarelz is now a district of Mosbach . In the past, Meckesheim belonged to the district of Heidelberg , all places between Eschelbronn and Helmstadt belonged to the district of Sinsheim , Aglasterhausen and all the towns on the now dismantled route, however, to the district of Mosbach ; Today, however, the route from Meckesheim to Helmstadt lies entirely in the Rhein-Neckar district , behind it (including the disused part) entirely in the Neckar-Odenwald district (main town Mosbach).

history

Course of the Badische Odenwaldbahn

History of origin

→ Main article: Odenwaldbahn (Baden)

The route from Meckesheim to Neckarelz was built as a section of the Baden Odenwald Railway , a central connection from Heidelberg via Mosbach to Würzburg . It was built mainly at the insistence of Bavaria, which wanted to see its then Rhine province, the Palatinate , connected to its rest of the railway network. It should therefore be closed from Ludwigshafen , the end point of the Palatinate Ludwig Railway , the gap to Mannheim , the end point of the Baden main line , and further to the east, a line branching off from the Baden main line in Heidelberg should lead to Würzburg. The route through the Neckar Valley to the city of Eberbach, which was closest in topographical terms, was ruled out because it would have led through Hessian territory.

For this reason, several clearly more complicated routes were considered between Heidelberg and Mosbach; one ran via Sinsheim, another via Mönchzell and Spechbach, a third was to follow the Schwarzbach to Aglasterhausen. Ultimately, the decision was made for the topographically uncomplicated one, which runs through the Neckar Valley to Neckargemünd, follows Elsenz to Meckesheim, then the Schwarzbach, crosses the Neckar near Mosbach and then leads through northeast Baden via Osterburken and Lauda to Würzburg.

On May 7, 1858, a railway construction law was passed for the Odenwaldbahn section Heidelberg-Mosbach. According to the original plan, the line was laid out with two tracks, but only built as a single track. The construction of the Mörtelsteiner Tunnel and the Neckar Bridge between Obrigheim and Neckarelz, the largest bridge structure on the route, were particularly complex. Because there was a lack of financial means and the outbreak of the Sardinian War in northern Italy plunged Europe into a political crisis that was unfavorable to the project, construction work even came to a standstill between April 18 and October 20, 1859. In 1861 a Neckar flood delayed the completion of the bridge at Neckarelz.

Operation under the Baden State Railways and the Deutsche Reichsbahn (1862-1945)

The Grand Ducal Baden State Railways , which had existed in the Grand Duchy since 1840 and were integrated into the Deutsche Reichsbahn in 1920 , began operating on the Badische Odenwaldbahn between Heidelberg and Mosbach on October 23, 1862. However, the volume of traffic remained lower than expected; Above all, the Neckar valley line Neckargemünd – Neckarsteinach – Eberbach – Neckarelz – Mosbach, which opened on May 24, 1879, effectively downgraded the Meckesheim-Neckarelz section to a branch line in the following years , as the trains on the Heidelberg-Würzburg route preferred their route via the Neckar valley. Even compared to all the other sections into which the Baden Odenwaldbahn was then divided, the route from Meckesheim to Neckarelz had the least amount of traffic. Despite the two-track layout, the line was left single-track.

Development of the rail network around Neckarelz

With the opening of the Neckar Valley Railway, the station in Neckarelz, previously located on the southern outskirts, was relocated to this new railway line and thus away from the older route of the Badische Odenwaldbahn.

It was not until 1887 that the town of Neckarbischofsheim received its station on the line. Since the limestone quarries in the Krebsbachtal between the communities of Helmhof and Obergimpern made a railway connection seem cheap, the Krebsbachtalbahn , a private branch line to Hüffenhardt , was built from this station . It was opened on October 15, 1902.

Between 1920 and 1930 the line was expanded to accommodate higher axle loads. The steel bridge over the Elsenz in kilometer 20.936 was rebuilt in 1925.

former warehouse for the armaments factory "Goldfisch " at the former Finkenhof stop (July 2006)

From 1944 to 1945 there was a subcamp of the Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp in Neckarelz , the prisoners there had to do forced labor in Obrigheim to create gypsum and production tunnels for the planned armaments factory with the code name “Goldfisch” (details here ). For this purpose, the Finkenhof stop was established between Obrigheim and Neckarelz and a siding was laid in the immediate vicinity .

The Neckarelzer railway bridge in 1930

On March 30, 1945, German troops moving southeast blew up the Neckarelzer railway bridge, the only fixed river crossing in a wide area, in order to make it more difficult for the Allies to cross the Neckar. Because of the relatively minor importance of the railway line, the structure was not rebuilt after the war.

Shutdown of parts and privatization (1945-2010)

After the Second World War, the newly founded Deutsche Bundesbahn took over operations on the remaining route between Meckesheim and Obrigheim. It officially closed the section between Obrigheim and Neckarelz, which had been interrupted since 1945 , on September 9, 1949. From the 1950s onwards, rail buses were increasingly used on the remaining route. At that time, the state train station from Neckarbischofsheim was renamed Neckarbischofsheim Nord and the town of Daudenzell, located between Aglasterhausen and Asbach, received a stop for the first time. Efforts to rebuild the Neckar Bridge, which was blown up in 1945, for example by the then Sinsheim District Administrator, were unsuccessful.

Eschelbronn station, 1978

Because of the costs for the maintenance of the Aglasterhausen –Obrigheim section with its two tunnels, the Federal Ministry of Transport approved the shutdown of all traffic on May 10, 1971, which was carried out when the timetable was changed on September 25, 1971. The rails were dismantled from the mid-1970s and they were finished in 1980. At around the same time, the Deutsche Bundesbahn was keen to shut down the rest of the route. The official conversion to a branch line on the part of the Deutsche Bundesbahn took place on September 29, 1974, although the line had in fact no longer served as a main line for almost a hundred years.

On January 24, 1978 at around 1 p.m., a damaged wagon train that had been parked on the disused Aglasterhausen – Asbach track broke. A collision was prevented by the dispatcher, for example by clearing the main track in Waibstadt at short notice even though two trains were already in the station. In addition, unsuccessful attempts were made to stop the car in Waibstadt with hindrances; they finally came to a stop on the slope between Neidenstein and Eschelbronn.

Two years after the last sugar beet loading in Meckesheim, Helmstadt followed in 1979 (326 wagons), one year later Aglasterhausen (197 wagons; 4300 tons) and the following year Eschelbronn (151 wagons).

NE 81 railcar of the SWEG in Helmstadt (July 2004)

On January 1, 1982, the state-owned Südwestdeutsche Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (SWEG) took over the line from the Federal Railroad under a 20-year lease , as the planned closure of the Krebsbachtalbahn to Hüffenhardt, which is operated by SWEG and branches off in Neckarbischofsheim Nord, would otherwise be connected would have lost to the railway network.

The leasing of the Schwarzbachtalbahn by SWEG was the first nationwide regionalization of a state railway line. The SWEG modernized and rationalized operations to a large extent. For example, the timetable has been significantly improved. Thanks to the modernization measures, SWEG succeeded in increasing the number of passengers and thus saving the route from being closed.

In the summer of 2009, the SWEG stopped the traffic on the Krebsbachtalbahn , because operating the branch line to Hüffenhardt would have become even less profitable than before. Due to the lack of future prospects for the Neckarbischofsheim operating location, many SWEG employees from there had already moved to other companies, so there was a lack of train drivers for the Schwarzbachtal and Krebsbachtalbahn. Individual connections were therefore switched to bus transport in May 2007; Due to a lack of staff, the section from Meckesheim to Aglasterhausen was no longer served by rail on weekends and public holidays from August 2007, but by bus.
The lease agreement between DB and SWEG for the route, which expired in 2002, has only been extended for one year since then. The lease contract ended on July 31, 2009.

As of August 1, 2009, all passenger traffic on the railway was suspended and a replacement rail service was set up. The entire route has been modernized and electrified. In December of the same year, DB Regio took over the traffic, the rail replacement traffic was adapted to the future service improvements of the S-Bahn and carried out by BRN Busverkehr Rhein-Neckar GmbH .

Integration into the network of the RheinNeckar S-Bahn (since 2010)

Originally from December 14th, 2009 the S-Bahn RheinNeckar with electric multiple units of the 425 series was supposed to roll into the Schwarzbachtal as the new line “S 51”, but due to a delayed start of construction and the severe winter of 2009/10 the date had to be postponed twice The S-Bahn could only start operating in June 2010. On May 28, 2010, the first DB Regio train crossed the route, but it was still an internal combustion engine. The opening ceremony was on June 12, 2010. Due to the unexpectedly high utilization of the trial drives, these were briefly compressed to a half-hourly cycle with a second vehicle.

modernized Neckarbischofsheim Nord stop (June 2010)
Aglasterhausen stop (June 2010)
S-Bahn at the final stop in Aglasterhausen (March 2011)

From March 8 to April 23, 2018, the route was closed to construction work.

business

Vehicle use and timetable

After the line was opened in 1862, some of the former broad gauge locomotives of the types II, IIIc, IV, V, and VIII, but also those of the type XI that had already been built in standard gauge, operated. These bore names such as ODENWALD , GERMANIA , TREVITHIK , Dreisam , etc. After the Second World War, rail buses were increasingly used.

In the 1950s the trains from Meckesheim to Aglasterhausen took around 35 to 40 minutes, back a little longer.

NE 81 railcar of SWEG in Waibstadt station (July 2001)

Since the line was taken over by SWEG, it has formed an operational unit together with the branching Krebsbachtalbahn; the official SWEG name was during this time MAH ( M eckesheim- A glasterhausen / H üffenhardt). From 1982 to 2009 " Esslingen railcars " as well as NE 81 vehicles and MAN rail buses were used.

On weekdays the company ran between four and eight o'clock; With the exception of a few gaps, it was driven at least every hour; mornings and evenings were sometimes half-hourly. On school days there was also a pair of trains that ran from Aglasterhausen to Neckarbischofsheim Stadt; the direction of travel was changed in Neckarbischofsheim Nord and the train then went to the next station on the Krebsbachtalbahn. This route was determined primarily in the interest of school traffic and again in particular because of the Adolf-Schmitthenner-Gymnasium located in Neckarbischofsheim . In addition, until 2007 some train services ran through the Krebsbachtalbahn from / to Hüffenhardt.

The course book number under which the route was recorded by Deutsche Bahn changed several times after the Second World War. In 1970 it was recorded under the number 303d, f , in 1992 under 562 . The last course book number for the operation of the SWEG was 707 . The current route number for S-Bahn operations has been 665.5 since the 2009/10 timetable . The tariff of the Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Neckar (VRN) applies to the entire route . The S 51 of the S-Bahn RheinNeckar now runs on the route . Of the total of 26 pairs of trains, 13 are tied to and from Meckesheim: ten to Heidelberg, two to Mannheim and one to Mainz. With one exception, there is no connection on the weekends. Be used EMUs of 425 series .

When the timetable changed in December 2015, the RheinNeckar S-Bahn and thus also the current S 51 line were put out to tender. The plan was to use new vehicles, so the class 425 electric multiple units were to be replaced by new multiple units. Ultimately, it was decided to continue to use the old railcars.

Freight transport

From 1868 a pair of freight trains ran on the route between Heidelberg and Würzburg, in the following years the freight traffic increased. The Badische Odenwaldbahn, part of which it was at the time, was particularly important in the Franco-German War of 1870/71. With the opening of the Neckar Valley Railway in 1879, the long-distance freight trains on the Heidelberg – Würzburg route ran across the Neckar Valley and freight transport between Meckesheim and Neckarelz decreased significantly.

During the SWEG era, freight wagons were loaded with wood from the Kleiner Odenwald on a relatively large scale along the route . Freight wagon delivery and collection was still offered at almost all stops on the way. The Bundeswehr depot in Siegelsbach on the Krebsbachtalbahn was also occasionally serviced, with a Deutsche Bahn locomotive last being used here.

Relics of the disused section Aglasterhausen – Neckarelz

From the current end of the route in Aglasterhausen, you can still follow the former route very well. Shortly after the train station, she touched a bird sanctuary there. From a crossing side road bridge in Daudenzell you can guess the former stop there. The station building of the former Asbach station is still standing; it is now privately owned. The Mörtelstein tunnel was bricked up and is now used to grow mushrooms. In Mörtelstein you can find the old station building with platform on a well-preserved route. The adjoining Erlesrain tunnel is open to the public. A converted warehouse is evidence of the former “Finkenhof” stop, which was part of the “Goldfisch” underground relocation . The following 147 m long Kalksberg tunnel (through the Karlsberg) is not accessible. A station keeper's house at the other tunnel portal to the Neckar is used as a residential building.

What remains are the abutments of the former arch bridge over the Neckar, northwest of today's Mosbacher Kreuz. A section of the route is still at 42.4 km of the Neckar Valley Railway between Neckarelz and Neckarzimmern, which crosses here, and freight wagons are occasionally parked on the track. Next to it is the building of the old Neckarelzer train station, which went out of service in 1879.

Former Asbach station building
Mörtelsteiner Tunnel (west portal)
Mörtelsteiner Tunnel (east portal)
Erlesraintunnel (east portal)
Kalksberg tunnel (west portal)

Trivia

On November 20, 1874, a railway attendant near Waibstadt was run over by a train. The victim survived the accident, seriously injured.
On April 12 and 13, 1886, the Baden State Railways carried out braking tests on the line. The train, which served as a test vehicle, was equipped with a Westinghouse and a slider brake. In addition to German railway staff, railway specialists from Austria and Switzerland also participated in this experiment.
On November 24, 1944 at 2 p.m., the building of the Neckarbischofsheim train station (today Neckarbischofsheim Nord ) was damaged by a bomb drop. Two sidings were affected, and communication lines were broken. The incident left two dead and four injured.
On March 13, 1945, the Allies bombed Eschelbronn station from the air; six people died.

literature

Thomas Estler: Railway Travel Guide Baden-Württemberg, Vol. 2, Northern Black Forest, Hohenlohe, Swabian Forest, Kraichgau . Transpress, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-613-71106-0 .

Hans-Wolfgang Scharf: Railways between Neckar, Tauber and Main . tape 1 : Historical development and railway construction . EK-Verlag, Freiburg (Breisgau) 2001, ISBN 3-88255-766-4 .

Hans-Wolfgang Scharf: Railways between Neckar, Tauber and Main . tape 2 : Design, operation and machine service . EK-Verlag, Freiburg (Breisgau) 2001, ISBN 3-88255-768-0 .

Gerd Wolff, Hans-Dieter Menges: German small and private railways, Vol. 2, Baden . EK-Verlag, Freiburg (Breisgau) 1992, ISBN 3-88255-653-6 .

Peter-Michael Mihailescu, Matthias Michalke: Forgotten railways in Baden-Württemberg . Konrad Theiss Verlag, Stuttgart 1985, ISBN 3-8062-0413-6 , p. 25-27 .

Web links

Commons : Railway line Meckesheim – Neckarelz - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m Jürgen Heß, Herbert Hoffmann, Siegbert Luksch: No. 5: Looking back at 150 years of the Meckesheim railway location: 11: Chronology. (PDF; 568 KiB) November 29, 2013, accessed January 2017 .
↑ Jürgen Heß: A look back at 150 years of the Meckesheim railway location (= series of publications on the local history of Meckesheim . No. 5 ). November 29, 2013, 9 timetables .
↑ the rail bus . 6/2005, p. 79.

This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on December 25, 2006 .

[Heß-Chronologie-11-1] ↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m Jürgen Heß, Herbert Hoffmann, Siegbert Luksch: No. 5: Looking back at 150 years of the Meckesheim railway location: 11: Chronology. (PDF; 568 KiB) November 29, 2013, accessed January 2017 .

[Heß-Chronologie-9-2] Jürgen Heß: A look back at 150 years of the Meckesheim railway location (= series of publications on the local history of Meckesheim . No. 5 ). November 29, 2013, 9 timetables .

[schienenbus-200506-3] the rail bus . 6/2005, p. 79.