Emmental Railway

This article describes the former railway company, for the railway infrastructure company in the Emmental see Emmentalbahn GmbH .

Solothurn – Burgdorf – Langnau
Timetable field :	304.1, 304.2, 340
Route length:	38.22 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system :	from 1932: 15 kV 16.7 Hz  ~
Power system :	Burgdorf – Hasle-Rüegsau from 1899, Hasle-Rüegsau – Langnau from 1919: 750 V 40 Hz  ∆
Maximum slope :	12  ‰
Minimum radius :	250 m
Legend Jura foot line to Biel / Bienne Route to Moutier former route to Büren an der Aare 0.00 Solothurn end point S 44 432  m above sea level M. Connection to the Solothurn-Niederbipp-Bahn and Solothurn-Zollikofen-Bern-Bahn S 8 Gäubahn from Olten A5 (270 m) Bern – Solothurn route Emme Biberist (87 m) former industrial railway Their endings 436  m above sea level M. Upgraded line from Wanzwil (former route from Herzogenbuchsee ) 4.69 Biberist East 447  m above sea level M. 5.85 Gerlafingen 452  m above sea level M. 8.02 Wiler 463  m above sea level M. 10.58 Utzenstorf 474  m above sea level M. Emme Aefligen (61 m) 14.44 Aefligen 497  m above sea level M. New Mattstetten – Rothrist line A1 (87 m) 16.63 Kirchberg - Alchenflüh 509  m above sea level M. 19.67 Burgdorf Buchmatt 525  m above sea level M. Line from Bern S 4 S 44 20.74 Burgdorf (wing S 4 S 44 ) 533  m above sea level M. Route to Olten 21.79 Lerchenbühl 537  m above sea level M. 22.64 Burgdorf Steinhof 544  m above sea level M. 24.30 Oberburg 547  m above sea level M. 27.67 Hasle-Rüegsau 571  m above sea level M. Burgdorf-Thun Railway to Thun 05/30 Lützelflüh -Goldbach 583  m above sea level M. Emme Gohlhaus (77 m) Ramsei-Sumiswald-Huttwil-Bahn S 44 32.41 Ramsei S 4 S 44 600  m above sea level M. 36.38 Zollbrück 625  m above sea level M. 37.63 Neumühle 633  m above sea level M. 39.64 Line from Bern 39.64 34.73 Obermatt 651  m above sea level M. 37.47 Langnau end point S 4 673  m above sea level M. Route to Lucerne

The Emmentalbahn (EB) was a railway company in Switzerland based in Burgdorf . The route leads from Solothurn via Burgdorf to Langnau in the Emmental . Today it is part of BLS AG .

history

The Emmenthalbahn Society was constituted on August 4, 1872 and has its seat in Burgdorf. The license was granted on May 1, 1872 for 99 years.

On June 20, 1942, the general assembly in Langnau approved the merger agreement with the Burgdorf-Thun-Bahn . This merger led to the establishment of the Emmental-Burgdorf-Thun-Bahn .

Opening of operations with steam traction

Locomotive No. 12 Jlfis of the Emmental Railway

The Emmental Railway emerged from the Derendingen - Biberist - Gerlafingen industrial horse-drawn railway, which opened on April 1, 1864 and which in Derendingen connected to the route from Herzogenbuchsee to Solothurn.

The first stage of the standard-gauge railway was opened on May 26, 1875 between Burgdorf and Derendingen. For this, the 15.62-kilometer route from Burgdorf to Biberist was rebuilt by the Emmental Railway and linked with the industrial railway from Biberist to Derendingen. On December 4, 1876, the Swiss Central Railway (SCB) opened the so-called Gäubahn Olten – Solothurn – Busswil, including a 4.33 kilometer branch line from Solothurn to Biberist with an introduction to the Emmental Railway station. The branch line changed to EB on November 21, 1883, whereupon operations on the Biberist – Derendingen section were discontinued on June 30, 1884.

The EB itself opened the 18.23 kilometer route between Burgdorf and Obermatt on May 12, 1881, a service station on the Gümligen – Langnau line of the then Bern-Lucerne Railway (BLB). The last almost three kilometers between Obermatt and Langnau have therefore been covered on foreign tracks since the opening.

New, powerful steam locomotives of the Ed 4/5 type

Steam locomotive Ed 4/5 No. 8 of the Emmental Railway

In 1899 and 1914, the EB procured three steam locomotives of the type Ed 4/5 with the road numbers 6 to 8, as they were built in a similar design for other Swiss private railways, including the Ec 4/5 for the Thunerseebahn . The locomotives 6 to 7 were wet steam locomotives and worked after not quite simple two-cylinder composite system .

The machine no. 8 with year 1914 as superheated steam built -Zwillingsmaschine, but otherwise largely corresponded to their predecessors. The superheated steam engine achieved 700 hp and thus had a greater output than the other locomotives. After the electrification of the Emmental Railway, Ed 4/5 No. 8 served as a catenary-independent reserve locomotive until 1965. In 1972 it was donated by the EBT to the Steam Railway Association Bern (VDBB) and was thoroughly revised by 1978. Unfortunately, in 1995, after 81 years of loyal service, the boiler had to be refused. In 1999 the locomotive was able to resume service with a new boiler, but had to be taken out of service again at the end of 2008, as a major overhaul was due in the mechanical part.

Electrifications

To ensure that there were enough railcars for three-phase operation to Langnau, the BTB added two BCe 2/5 to its inventory in 1921 .

Electrification priority share of the Emmenthalbahn company from June 27, 1931

Since the opening of the Burgdorf-Thun Railway (BTB) on July 21, 1899, the Emmental Railway has operated this railway on the basis of an operating contract and granted it the right to travel on its route from Burgdorf to Hasle-Rüegsau . The director of EB was also the president of the Burgdorf – Thun railway. The BTB had been electrified with 700 volts 40 Hertz three-phase current since it started operating . So that their trains could run continuously from Burgdorf to Thun, the section of the EB from Burgdorf to Hasle-Rüegsau was also spanned with the two-pole three-phase contact line.

During the First World War, there were severe traffic restrictions on steam-powered railway lines due to a lack of coal. The EB then carried out a so-called emergency electrification on the section from Hasle-Rüegsau to Langnau. It took place with the same electricity system as with the neighboring BTB. Five used BTB transformers were installed along the route . A high-voltage line from Schafhausen to Lützelflüh supplied the EB with electrical energy. From December 17, 1919, the electrical operation was started, with the train was carried with locomotives of the BTB.

→ See also: section vehicles for three-phase operation in the article Burgdorf-Thun-Bahn

In the 1932s, the lines of the EB and BTB were converted in several stages to single-phase alternating current with 15,000 volts 16⅔ Hertz:
• September 1, 1932: Solothurn - Burgdorf:
• December 8, 1932: Burgdorf - Langnau

Merger to form EBT

The Emmental railway merged in 1942 with the Burgdorf-Thun-Bahn (BTB) for Emmental-Burgdorf-Thun Railway (EBT). During the Second World War, the Bernese cantonal government planned the construction of the Swiss central airport in Utzenstorf ; The airport, which was never built, should have been developed through a branch line that would have branched off the Emmental Railway at Aefligen.

On April 21, 1952, at the Obermatt service station between Emmenmatt and Langnau in Emmental, there was a head-on collision between an EBT freight train hauled by the Be 4/4 105 and the SBB Ae 3/6 II 10424 locomotive . Due to poor visibility, the vehicles collided with each other with full force. The locomotive driver of the freight train was killed, and his colleague from SBB was able to save himself by jumping off the machine. Four train attendants were injured.

In 1997, the EBT merged with the United Huttwil-Bahnen (VHB) and the Solothurn-Münster-Bahn (SMB) to form the Regionalverkehr Mittelland (RM). In 2006, the RM and the BLS Lötschbergbahn became the BLS AG .

literature

• Encyclopedia of Railways. Volume 4, 1913, p. 300.
• Kurt Oehler: 100 years of operation for the Emmental Railway in Switzerland . In: Lok-Magazin . No. 72 . Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung, W. Keller & Co. , 1975, ISSN  0458-1822 , p. 234-247 .

Web links

• BLS AG website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Prospectus 4/12 Mortgage Loan in 1 Rank 1931.  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Basel underground station [Emmental-Burgdorf-Thun-Bahn - Burgdorf. [Var.loc.], 1915-1996. 2 boxes (0.18 m). [000932825]] ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.    
2. ↑ Der Bund, Bern No. 286 of June 23, 1942
3. ^ Steam Railway Bern - Rolling Stock , accessed on May 3, 2018
4. ^ Franz Eberhard, Hansruedi Gonzenbach: Faszination Ae 3/6 II. MFO - express train locomotive of the SBB: The original and its replicas (=  Loki-Spezial ). Fachpresse Zürich, Zürich 2004, ISBN 3-9522945-1-9 , p. 82 .