Railway Law (Germany)

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Railway law refers to the legal norms under public and private law that regulate the construction, operation, economic performance, corporate governance and the position of public railways in the economic system.

Railway law as an independent legal sector

The word railway law is indisputably a collective term in practice that can be used to describe standards relating to the railway. However, it cannot necessarily be concluded from this that these norms actually form an independent area of ​​law. Rather, these norms originate from a wide variety of areas of law and - unlike mining law, for example, do not at first glance appear to be a coherent whole; there is no codification . The question of whether and which standards with reference to the railways can still be systematized in a separate area of ​​law is important for jurisprudence insofar as the validity of overarching general legal principles and principles of interpretation in a given area of ​​law are of great importance for the interpretation of standards; Furthermore, this classification has consequences for the systematisation of the field of law.

In the scientific debate about the recognition as a legal area was at the beginning of the development of the railway sector, the idea that this the Heads of State and Administrative Law is attributable, moreover, under the general commercial law norms of freight regulations fall: A railway law in the strict sense, there is not therefore. This position also finds supporters in more recent literature: Railway law remains a mere collective term for practice without any legal theoretical content of its own. At first, the view that railway law constitutes an independent legal matter, which is defined as the “totality of the regulations applicable to the railway system” or the “sum of those statutes according to which railway matters must be dealt with”, appears contrary to this. Such an unspecific and boundless definition could only lead to the realization that an independent systematization of this area of ​​law is no longer necessary: ​​The norms of railway law are ultimately subject to the principles of the various areas of the respective area of ​​law.

These views aroused criticism early on. Friedrich Meili complained in 1889 that "the matter of railway law [...] is not recognized as a legitimate part of jurisprudence", although there is "hardly anything more incorrect than this disintegration and detachment of the uniform and entirely independent matter". The increase in legal norms relating to railway law has recently brought railway law to more attention as a field of law. Railway law does not include all standards that apply to the railway sector. This definition is replaced by a more differentiated approach; so different Kunz between three sets of standards with railway legal terms:

  1. Exclusive / special railway law: This includes all regulations that exclusively concern the railway industry, such as the General Railway Act or the technical regulations on the construction and operation of railways .
  2. Norms that originate from general law, but contain special regulations with regard to railways or norms of general law that expressly do not relate to railways , but have their primary or sole area of ​​application in the field of railways, e.g. B. the Railway Crossing Act , § 315 StGB, § 1 HPflG.
  3. Norms that stem from general law and that apply equally to the railway system and to all other legal subjects.

Legal sources (selection)

General Laws

The most important German laws and regulations are:

Business management laws

Historical laws

Institutions

Web links

Legal provisions of German railway law

literature

Text collections

Secondary literature

  • Wolfgang Kunz: Railway Law - A Legal Matter? A plea for an independent area of ​​law . In: Transport Law. Journal for the entire law of freight transport . 2006.
  • Wolfgang Kunz / Urs Kramer (eds.), Railway Law (loose-leaf collection), Nomos-Verlagsgesellschaft, Baden-Baden, 52nd supplement. 2019, ISSN 0946-8560.
  • Michael Ronellenfitsch, Ralf Schweinsberg, Iris Henseler-Unger: Current Problems of Railway Law XV - Lectures at the conference on September 2nd and 3rd, 2009 in Tübingen . Kovač, Hamburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-8300-5308-8 .
  • Thomas Schmitt and Erik Staebe: Introduction to Railway Regulatory Law . CH Beck, Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-406-60343-3 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Brockhaus - Encyclopedia in twenty volumes. 17th edition. FA Brockhaus, Wiesbaden 1968, Volume 4, p. 349.
  2. ^ Railway law. In: Viktor von Röll (ed.): Encyclopedia of the Railway System . 2nd Edition. Volume 4: Express Train Driving Rules . Urban & Schwarzenberg, Berlin / Vienna 1913, pp  108 -112.
  3. ↑ a b Wolfgang Kunz : Railway Law - A legal matter? A plea for an independent area of ​​law . In: Transport Law. Journal for the entire law of freight transport . July / August, 2006, p. 274-296 .
  4. ^ Roderich von Kienitz : The German railway law . In: newspaper of the Association of Central European Railways . 1927, p. 619 .
  5. ^ Karl Strupp and Hans-Jürgen Schlochauer : Dictionary of international law . tape I . de Gruyter, Berlin 1960, Railway Law, Internationales, p. 417 .
  6. ^ Wilhelm Endemann : The law of the railways . Fues, Leipzig 1886, p. 5 .
  7. ^ Max Haushofer : Basic features of the railway system in its economic, political and legal relationships . Maier, Stuttgart 1873, p. 5 .
  8. ^ Wilhelm Weil: The railways in international law . Petmecky brothers, Kiedrich 1913, p. 55 .
  9. ^ Friedrich Meili : The international unions on the law of betting companies and intellectual property . Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, p. 59 .
  10. ↑ Landesrecht-bw.de Ordinance on the Compensation of Public Services in Rail Traffic
  11. ↑ a b Description of the tasks of the EBA on its website (accessed on August 1, 2011) ( Memento from January 5, 2013 in the web archive archive.today )
  12. ^ Page of the Federal Network Agency ( Memento from April 12, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on August 1, 2011.