Wrocław Świebodzki – Zgorzelec railway line

	0.000	Wrocław Świebodzki formerly Breslau Freib Bf *
		to Wrocław-Gądów
		Szczecin – Wrocław
		from Wrocław Główny via Wrocław-Grabiszyn
	1.563	Podg. WS
		Freight bypass
		to Wrocław-Muchobór
		from Wrocław-Gądów
	5,201	Wrocław-Zachodni formerly Lohbrück *
		to Wrocław Klecina
	10,461	Smolec formerly Schmolz *
	14.786	Sadowice Wrocławskie formerly Schill *
	20.365	Kąty Wrocławskie formerly Kanth *
	28.772	Podg. Mietków
		(Re-routing)
	29.718	Mietków formerly Mettkau *
		Mietków Bocznica Majkoltrans

	35.848	Imbramowice formerly Ingramsdorf *
	42.612	Żarów formerly Saarau *
		by Kamienec Zabkowicki
	48.140	Jaworzyna Śląska formerly the royal tent *
		to Legnica
	53.729	Świebodzice Ciernie formerly Zirlau *
	57.541	Świebodzice formerly Freiburg (Schles)
	65.930	Wałbrzych Szczawienko formerly Nieder Salzbrunn
		to Boguszów Gorce – Meziměstí
	69,806	Wałbrzych Miasto formerly Waldenburg-Altwasser
	72,588	Wałbrzych Thorez
	74,566	Wałbrzych Fabryczny formerly Waldenburg (Schles)
		by Kłodzko Główne
	78.912	Wałbrzych Główny formerly Waldenburg-Dittersbach *
		Schönhuter Tunnel (284 m; removed in 1933/1937)
	82.783	Szybowice Wałbrzyskie (1985–1991)
		by Wałbrzych Szczawienko
	83.856	Boguszów Gorce Wschód formerly Fellhammer *
	83.87	to Meziměstí
		Connecting curve from Boguszów Gorce Towarowa
	85.513	Boguszów Gorce formerly Gottesberg (Schles) *
	88,352	Boguszów Gorce Zachód formerly Rothenbach (Schles) *
		after cop. melafiru Czarny Bór
	93.017	Witków Śląski formerly Wittgendorf (Kr Landeshut Schles) *
	98.843	Sędzisław formerly Ruhbank *
		to Lubawka
		Bober Bridge
		Connection curve from Podg. Kruzin
	101.412	Podg. Marciszów Górny
		Bober Bridge
		from Strzegom
	105.182	Marciszów formerly Merzdorf (Schles) *
		to Jerzmanice Zdrój
		Bober Bridge
	107.86	Ciechanowice formerly pack town *
		Bober Bridge
		Bober Bridge
	113.58	Janowice Wielkie formerly Jannowitz (Schles) *
		Bober Viaduct
	117.103	Trzcińsko formerly Rohrlach *
		Rohrlacher tunnel
	120.753	Wojanów formerly Schildau (Bober) *
		from Kamienna Góra
	125.808	Jelenia Góra formerly Hirschberg (Rsgb) Hbf *
		Bober Bridge
	127.125	Jelenia Góra Zabobrze
		after Lwówek Śląski
		Bober Viaduct
	129.320	Podg. Dębowa Góra
		to Szklarska Poręba
	136.333	Rybnica formerly Reibnitz *
	142.062	Stara Kamienica formerly Altkemnitz (Riesengeb) *
	146.812	Kwieciszowice formerly flower village *
	151.844	Rębiszów formerly Rabishau *
	157.344	Młyńsko formerly mill soaps *
		from Mirsk (–Jindřichovice pod Smrkem)
		Oil bridge
	163.412	Gryfów Śląski formerly Greiffenberg (Schles) *
		after Lwówek Śląski
	165.963	Ubocze formerly Schosdorf *
	169.72	Olszyna Lubańska formerly long oil *
		Queis Bridge
		from Leśna
	177.79	Lubań Śląski formerly Lauban *
		to Węgliniec
	184.037	Zaręba formerly Lichtenau (Schles) *
	188.53	Batowice Lubańskie formerly Nieder Heidersdorf *
	191.85	Mikułowa formerly Nikolausdorf *
		to Zawidów / Bogatynia
		Connection curve from Podg. read
	192.999	Podg. Studniska
	197,383	Jerzmanki formerly Hermsdorf (b Görlitz) *
	199.829	Podg. Krysin
		to Podg. Zgorzelec miasto
		from Węgliniec
	201.433	Zgorzelec formerly Görlitz-Moys * ( wedge station )
	202.455	Poland-Germany border
		to Görlitz

* German station names from 1944

The Wrocław Świebodzki – Zgorzelec railway is a main line in Poland that was originally built and operated by the Breslau-Schweidnitz-Freiburg Railway Company and the Prussian State Railways . It runs in Lower Silesia from Wrocław (Breslau) via Wałbrzych (Waldenburg) and Jelenia Góra (Hirschberg) to Zgorzelec / Görlitz . The Wałbrzych (Waldenburg) –Zgorzelec / Görlitz section is part of the Silesian Mountain Railway .

meaning

In Prussia , the route was of enormous importance for the dispatch of coal from the Waldenburg Revier to Central Germany and Berlin as well as for rush hour traffic to the hard coal pits there.

With the onset of tourism in the Silesian Giant Mountains, direct express trains from Berlin were run over this route, such as the bathing train to Bad Kudowa , which also carried through coaches to Ober Schreiberhau and Krummhübel .

The line was one of the first electrified railway lines in Germany. The knowledge gained here had a pioneering character for the further development of electric traction in Germany.

history

Prehistory and construction

Wrocław – Wałbrzych

The line from Breslau to Altwasser was built by the Breslau-Schweidnitz-Freiburg Railway Company . It was the second railway line in Silesia and was supposed to facilitate the removal of hard coal from the Waldenburg district. The section between Breslau and Freiburg in Silesia ( Świebodzice in Polish ) went into operation on October 29, 1843. The Freiburg train station in Wroclaw built for the route is no longer in operation today. The unfavorable location at the foot of the mountains made it necessary to reload the coal, which had to be brought by carts over inclines to the end of the route in Freiburg. On March 10, 1853, the route via Altwasser (today Wałbrzych Miasto) and Waldenburg under Bf. To Wrangelschacht was therefore extended and thus enabled direct coal removal. However, tourist traffic was only operated as far as the oxbow lake.

Opening dates:

Breslau – Freiburg: October 29, 1843
Freiburg – Altwasser: May 1, 1853

A route change at Mettkau due to a planned reservoir was planned by the Reichsbahn at the end of the 1930s and implemented by the PKP in 1983 as part of the construction of the reservoir.

Wałbrzych – Zgorzelec (Silesian Mountain Railway)

A first project for a rail connection from Görlitz via Hirschberg and Waldenburg and on to Glatz dates back to 1853. At that time, Prussia was planning its own direct connection between Berlin and Vienna , bypassing the Kingdom of Saxony . However, for strategic reasons Austria was not interested in a railway line running parallel to its own border.

Only with the beginning of industrialization in Germany was the old project taken up again in order to obtain a cheap transport route for the hard coal mined in the Waldenburg district to the west and Berlin. On September 24, 1862, the Prussian state parliament decided to build the Silesian Mountain Railway from Kohlfurt to Waldenburg with a branch line from Görlitz to Lauban . The kilometering of the line was carried out in Kohlfurt on the now nationalized Lower Silesian-Märkische Eisenbahn from Berlin.

Beginning in Görlitz and Kohlfurt , the line was completed in sections in the years 1865 to 1867 to Dittersbach and on to Altwasser , where the line of the Breslau-Schweidnitz-Freiburg Railway Company was connected.

Opening dates:

Görlitz-Moys - Lauban - Reibnitz : September 20, 1865
Kohlfurt –Lauban: September 20, 1865
Reibnitz– Hirschberg : August 20, 1866
Hirschberg– Dittersbach –Waldenburg: August 16, 1867
Waldenburg – Altwasser: May 28, 1868

electrification

After initial successful trials in Central Germany, Berlin and Hamburg, the electric train operation should also be tested under difficult long-distance traffic conditions. A section of the Silesian Mountain Railway was selected for this purpose. On June 30, 1911, the Prussian Landtag approved 9.9 million Reichsmarks for the electrification of the main Lauban – Dittersbach – Königszelt line with branch lines.

In 1912, construction work began on the Mittelsteine railway power station on the route to Glatz, which was supposed to generate the electricity required for railway operations from low-quality hard coal at low cost. The companies AEG , Siemens-Schuckert and BEW received the order to equip the lines with a catenary .

The overhead lines were constructed in a similar way to the types on the Dessau – Bitterfeld – Leipzig – Halle line on a double-track line and in train stations using the yoke construction method and on a single-track line with single masts. The Fellhammer Gbf and Jannowitz train stations were equipped with cross-cable structures on a trial basis. This construction method established itself as the standard for the electrification of train stations in Germany by the end of the millennium. In 1923, spun concrete masts were erected in Nikolausdorf station (today: Mikułowa) as guy masts for the cross-cable structures. According to the standardization principles of the Reichsbahn, from 1922 there was also a transition to single-mast construction on double-track lines.

In operation in Silesia from 1915: E 71 series

On June 1, 1914, scheduled electrical operation began on the Nieder-Salzbrunn-Halbstadt main line . The First World War initially delayed further electrification. Contact wires that had already been installed were mostly removed and delivered to the metal mobilization office. In order to take advantage of the electric vehicles, the focus was on completing the steep routes in the Waldenburger Revier. In 1915 the first section of the Silesian Mountain Railway was converted to electrical operation. In some cases, iron wires were installed instead of copper contact wires. It was not until 1919 that electrification work on the Silesian Mountain Railway was continued.

In 1915 the first electric locomotives intended specifically for Silesia were delivered, the articulated locomotives called "Silesian Colossi", the three-part EG 538 abc ff. , Later E 91.3, and the EP 202 ff, later E 30. The two-part EG 551 ff., Later E 90.5 followed in 1918. The four (A1) (1A) railcars originally intended for Berlin (later DR series ET 88 ) were not added until 1921/22.

After the provisional cessation of electrical operation in Central Germany in August 1914, from the spring of 1915 to the summer of 1920 some electric locomotives intended for Central Germany were transferred to or delivered to Silesia. In addition to individual test locomotives (e.g. ES 2 and 3), some of the Prussian series locomotives ES 9 ff and the EG 511-516 (later class E 71 ) came to Silesia, where they were used on the routes from Nieder Salzbrunn to Halbstadt and from Königszelt to Gottesberg (from 1920 to Hirschberg).

The following table shows the opening dates of the electric train operation:

opening	route	km
July 15, 1915	Fellhammer - Gottesberg	1.7
January 1, 1916	Freiburg - Fellhammer	27.9
April 1, 1917	King's tent - Freiburg	9.2
October 22, 1919	Gottesberg - Ruhbank	13.3
December 8, 1919	Ruhbank - Merzdorf	6.3
January 16, 1920	Merzdorf - Schildau	15.6
June 21, 1920	Schildau - Hirschberg	5.1
April 15, 1922	Hirschberg - Lauban	51.9
September 1, 1923	Lauban - Görlitz	25.58
January 28, 1928	Breslau Freiburger Bf - king tent	48.31

In World War II

When the Soviet troops crossed the Oder towards the end of the Second World War in February 1945, the Silesian Mountain Railway was the only still functioning east-west connection in Silesia until May 1945. A large number of the 1.7 million war refugees who had to be evacuated from Silesia between January and May 1945 were transported westward on the Silesian Mountain Railway. After the line at Lauban was interrupted between February 17 and March 8, 1945 after an advance by the Red Army, a large part of the electric locomotives was driven west via Polaun and Liebau . Electric train traffic was therefore only partially possible until the end of the war on May 8, 1945. Immediately before the war ended in May 1945 of tube Lacher tunnel were Bober viaduct in Hirschberg and the Neisse viaduct in Görlitz by the Wehrmacht exploded.

In operation of the Polish State Railways

After the Second World War, Silesia came under Polish administration and the Silesian Mountain Railway became the property of the Polish State Railways PKP. Because of the blown viaducts, continuous train traffic was initially not possible. In 1945 the second track was dismantled as spoils of war by the Soviet occupying forces.

The Neisse Viaduct in Görlitz was only rebuilt in 1957

Passenger train from Koleje Dolnośląskie (Wałbrzych Główny; 2015)

After the damage to the energy supply had been repaired, electrical train operations between Hirschberg (since 1945: Jelenia Góra) and Waldenburg (since 1945: Wałbrzych) were resumed. Because of the blasted Rohrlacher Tunnel, however, all train traffic had to take the detour via the Hirschberg – Landeshut branch line . Ultimately, the electrified lines in Silesia also came under the reparation claims of the Soviet Union . From July 1945 the electrical contact lines had to be dismantled. In 1952 the Soviet Union sold the previously unused electrical equipment and vehicles to the Deutsche Reichsbahn in the GDR , which it used to rebuild the central German network.

In the 1960s, PKP began to rebuild the contact line, but now for the 3 kV direct current system that is common with PKP. On December 18, 1965, electrical operation could be started from Wrocław to Wałbrzych and on December 17, 1966 to Jelenia Góra. Since December 20, 1986 it has also been possible to drive electrically as far as Lubań Śląski ( Lauban ). Only the section between Görlitz / Zgorzelec and Lubań Śląski has remained without a contact wire to this day. It is astonishing that the old catenary masts from the 1920s were at least partially reused for the renewed electrification.

From September 30, 2002 to December 13, 2008 the passenger train service between Zgorzelec and Lubań Śląski was stopped. Passenger train traffic was resumed on December 14, 2008, but stopped again in May of the following year. This section of the route is important for freight traffic because of the cross-border traffic to the Czech Republic (border crossing Zawidów - Černousy ).

On December 11, 2011, travel between Zgorzelec and Lubań Śląski was resumed by the voivodeship's own railway company Koleje Dolnośląskie (KD) with five pairs of trains. Since December 13, 2015, three pairs of trains have been tied across borders to and from Görlitz.

Wrocław Świebodzki Railway Station
Wrocław Zachodni Railway Station
Świebodzice railway station
Wałbrzych Miasto railway station
Wałbrzych Główny Railway Station
Wojanow train station
Zgorzelec railway station

The Teatr Polski we Wrocławiu ( Polish Theater in Wroclaw ) is located in the Świebodzki station building in Wrocław .

literature

Civil engineering pit in Waldenburg

Siegfried Bufe: Railways in Silesia . Bufe Fachbuch Verlag, Egglham 2002, ISBN 3-922138-37-3 .
Klaus Kasper (Ed.): The Schönhuter Tunnel. From the problem child of the KPEV to the biggest cut of the Deutsche Reichsbahn. From an unusual tunnel life. Pictures, reports and documents . Klaus Kasper, Bonn-Oberkassel 2003, ISBN 3-930567-11-3 .
Bernd Kuhlmann: Railways across the Oder-Neisse border . Ritzau KG - Zeit und Eisenbahn Verlag, Pürgen 2004, ISBN 3-935101-06-6 .
Deutsche Reichsbahn (Ed.): The German railways in their development 1835-1935. Deutsche Reichsbahn, Berlin 1935 (completely unchanged reprint as: Horst-Werner Dumjahn (Hrsg.): Handbuch der Deutschen Eisenbahnbahnen. Opening dates 1835–1935, route lengths, concessions, ownership. Dumjahn, Mainz 1984, ISBN 3-921426-29-4 ( Railway history documents 29)).
H.-J. Wenzel, G. Greß: The Railway in Silesia, Eisenbahnkurier Special 3/2005 . EK-Verlag, 2005, ISSN 0170-5288 .
P. Glanert, Th. Scherrans, Th. Borbe, R. Lüderitz: Alternating current train operation in Germany, Volume 2: Electric in the Silesian Mountains 1911–1945. Oldenbourg Industrieverlag, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-8356-3218-9 .
Ryszard Stankiewicz, Marcin Stiasny: Atlas Linii Kolejowych Polski 2014 . Eurosprinter, Rybnik 2014, ISBN 978-83-63652-12-8 , pp. F3 u. G3 .