Venlo – Eindhoven railway line

Venlo – Eindhoven

An Intercity on the way to Venlo

Route length:

52 km

Gauge :

1435 mm ( standard gauge )

Power system :

1.5 kV =

Top speed:

160 km / h

Dual track :

Venlo – Eindhoven

Legend

		from Maastricht
		from Viersen
	0.0	Venlo
		Meuse
	1.3	Blerick
		Maas line to Nijmegen
	7.5	Heyerhoeven
	11.3	Horst - Sevenum
	16.3	America 1866-1938
	22.8	Helenaveen 1868-1938, 1940
	29.3	Deurne
	35.4	Helmond Brouwhuis
	38.4	Helmond
	40.5	Helmond 't Hout
	42.8	Mierlo
	43.0	Helmond Brandevoort
	47.0	Nuenen 1866-1938
		from Weert
	51.6	Eindhoven Centraal until the end of 2019 Eindhoven
		to Breda

The railway line Venlo-Eindhoven in the Netherlands connects the city of Venlo in Limburg with Eindhoven in Noord-Brabant over a length of 52 kilometers . It is one of the busiest railway lines in the Netherlands. The route is of great importance for international rail traffic.

history

In 1860 the Dutch government decided to connect the Netherlands to the surrounding countries through an extensive rail network. The construction of ten so-called state lines is an essential part of this program. To connect Brabant / Limburg, Staatslijn E was built between Breda and Maastricht. In contrast to other state lines, line E consists of three sections.

The last section to be built is the Venlo – Eindhoven line, which opened on October 1, 1866. In Venlo it connects to the section to Maastricht that was opened last year and at the same time to line G to Viersen in Germany. In Eindhoven the line connects to the section to Breda and the railway line to Hasselt in Belgium, which opened in 1866.

Six years later, the Büderich – Venlo line, which was part of the Paris-Hamburg Railway project, was opened. In 1883 the Maas line to Nijmegen was opened. The section meets line E in Blerick. The railway line between Eindhoven and Venlo was the only railway connection between Limburg and the rest of the Netherlands until then and remained the most important in the decades that followed.

New developments in the 20th century

In 1913 the original route of the Staatslijnen was cut off with the construction of the Eindhoven – Weert railway line . In Weert this is connected to Roermond with the Iron Rhine . Since then, a significant part of the traffic between Limburg and the rest of the Netherlands has been via this new connection. In addition, a number of trains ran over the Maas line. Since then, the route between Eindhoven and Venlo has been particularly important for cross-border rail traffic.

Since the route was only of minor importance for national passenger traffic, it was not electrified until 1956. This made it possible to operate international trains on the Dutch route with electric locomotives . At the same time as the electrification of the line, the Venlo train station was relocated. The new station is closer to the city center. This was made possible by removing the Haltern – Venlo railway line . Electric operation on the Viersen – Venlo railway has been possible from Germany since 1968 . Due to the different power systems, multi-system locomotives have to be used or the locomotive has to be changed in Venlo. Since the summer of 1999, there have been no more cross-border long-distance trains on the route.

The route between Helmond and Horst-Sevenum has a top speed of 160 km / h. This option is only used for test drives. A speed of 140 km / h is intended for normal traffic.

Web links

Commons : Venlo – Eindhoven railway line - collection of images, videos and audio files

Overzicht van de spoorlijn Venlo – Eindhoven . In: stationsweb.nl (Dutch).