Fish shipping station (Geestemünde)
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The fish shipping station in Geestemünde, completed in 1896, and its large replacement building from 1920 were used to ship sea fish to the inland . With the end of German deep-sea fishing , Bremerhaven 's largest train station was demolished in 1976–1978 .
First train station
In the Geestemünder Fischereihafen - for decades the largest fishing port in continental Europe - the first fish dispatch station was built in 1896. It was at the southern end of what would later become the fishing port I and ended at the seaman's home. On the other side of the port end was the coal store. The station had four pairs of tracks and three covered loading ramps where 36 wagons could be loaded at the same time. The supply to the Geestebahn was single-track through the western underpass of the ramp between Geestemünde and Wulsdorf . On May 1, 1897, the first special fish train left the new station in the direction of Berlin (via the American line ). Given the enormous growth, plans were made to expand the fish shipping station from 1913 with an additional track connection to Wulsdorf. The First World War delayed the expansion.
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Second train station
After a construction period of seven years, the second fish shipping station, south-southeast of the first, was completed in 1920.
investment
The fish dispatch hall, which was divided into four areas, extended over the entire width of the terminus station, which was a good 200 m. Initially, 12 tracks on six platforms led into the iron dispatch hall. Soon the sea fish refrigerator trucks were loaded onto a total of 17 tracks, each with a useful length of 137-200 m. The facility offered space for 136 wagons. Up to 12 trains with up to 40 wagons could be handled per day. The also single-track access, which was completed in 1920, crossed under Weserstraße (Bremerhaven) and ran on the southern edge of the Bremerhaven cemetery in Wulsdorf to the Bremerhaven-Wulsdorf train station . The fish dispatch station could not only be reached via the Wulsdorf connecting track, but also via a siding that crossed Hoebelstrasse (the main access to the fishing port) in a level crossing. This westernmost branch of the former Geestebahn ended in two short tracks in front of the reception building at the northern end of the dispatch hall. The wagons filled with ice came over the track to the fish shipping station. They were filled in front of the southern end of the Seebeck shipyard by F. Busse, then pulled under the ramp in the direction of Gleisdreieck and pushed from there via Hoebelstrasse to the fish station.
business
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In 1927, an average of 160 wagons a day left the fish shipping station. In the winter months with high consumption, up to 8,000 consignments of waybills were also sent in around 300 general cargo wagons. The capacity reached up to 1,000 tons per day. An extensive network of fish carts ensured the fastest possible delivery to the most distant parts of the German Reich . This required a tightly coordinated organization. It concerned both wagonload traffic and general cargo traffic , which made up about half of the total volume handled from Wesermünde . The 300 refrigerated trucks stationed here were only used for transporting fish, and almost exclusively for truckload traffic. The sea fish were packed in wicker baskets with ice. About 150 wholesalers were based in the fishing port . Official railway cartage entrepreneurs gathered up their cargo shipments. The latest acceptance deadline for the first fish hauls going into the Rhineland was 1.30 p.m. every day. For the other directions, the so-called exposure deadline was at 4 p.m. or 5 p.m. The set loading deadline was two hours later. The trains usually left an hour after the end of loading. The departures were very close together: the De 5104 left the fish dispatch station at 3:47 p.m., the De 5031 at 4:02 p.m. and the De 5112 at 4:52 p.m. The slightest delays in the loading business - rule rather than exception - led to problems in the process. In direct transport - without reloading or rearrangements - the trains reached a travel speed of 50 kilometers per hour . The trains were hauled by steam locomotives from the Geestemünde railway depot . B. at times DR series 41 and DR series 50 . The car wash on the west side of the Geestemünde freight station , which was behind the road bridge near the Ostrampe road in front of the Seebeck shipyard, was responsible for the regular cleaning of the refrigerated wagons .
Rise and fall
| year | Wagon provision | Tons of fish transported |
|---|---|---|
| 1872 | 439 | |
| 1890 | 5,000 | |
| 1893 | 9,500 | |
| 1898 | 649 | |
| 1903 | 25.211 | |
| 1913 | 5,221 | 47,308 |
| 1927 | 129,000 | |
| 1935 | 188,000 | |
| 1936 | 225,000 | |
| 1957 | 229,000 | |
| 1967 | 114,000 | |
| 1995 | 18,500 |
On January 28 and 29, 1937, experts from the Deutsche Reichsbahn visited the fishing port. In the four-year plan , the government had predicted an increase in fish consumption by 100%. Now it was to be found out which structural extensions were necessary to cope with the increase in transport technology. From Saturday to Tuesday of Holy Week of 1935, 1936 and 1937, the carriage collection was determined: 1008, 1208 and 1360 cars. Despite the forecast of 730,000 tonnes of sea fish to be landed, the Reichsbahn only expected an increase in general cargo of 30%. On the one hand, developments over the past three years have confirmed this forecast; on the other hand, the lower estimate of the increase resulted from the expectation that more fish fillets and finished products would be shipped in the future . It was therefore recommended that the fish dispatch station be expanded to nine platforms with space for 200 wagons to be processed at the same time. Ramps 7, 8 and 9 were built. The track systems were expanded considerably. The air raids on Wesermünde damaged the track and port facilities, the auction halls and the operating buildings. The performance of the fishing port was seriously affected. The reconstruction in post-war Germany was slow and tedious.
transport
The transport of sea fish was an expensive transport for the Deutsche Bundesbahn . The provision of a refrigerated truck fleet (exclusively for the transport of sea fish), the empty return of the trucks to Bremerhaven and the careful cleaning after the return resulted in high costs. From 1921, an exceptionally favorable tariff was in effect with a reduction of a third compared to the regular tariffs for general cargo and wagon loads . It only partially covered the costs. The distribution of small quantities to many recipients was a particular operational burden. For the large number of general cargo shipments with fish, eight reloading wagons were regularly dispatched from Bremerhaven to large general cargo reloading points inland and 14 through wagons for serving routes. The through car to serve the route from Düsseldorf main station to Aachen West station ran from Wulsdorf on Sg 5510, from Düsseldorf on passenger train 2304 via Neuss and Mönchengladbach . Accompanied by a load conductor, he reached Aachen West the next morning at 7:17 a.m. The destinations of these loading wagons were, among others, Frankfurt am Main , Stuttgart and Freiburg im Breisgau .
The End
The end of German deep-sea fishing , the restructuring of fish production and the switch to frozen products left the huge station only to have a subordinate function. From 1976 it was dismantled in sections. The shipping halls were demolished. Today the delivery of the raw goods and the delivery of the finished products are carried out almost exclusively by refrigerated trucks . All track systems in the port area have been removed. The connecting track to Wulsdorf was closed in 2017. Since then, the museum railway to Bederkesa no longer runs from the fishing port, but from Bremerhaven main station . As a result, the operating association got into economic difficulties.
Branch
Connecting track
See also
literature
- Walter Bollen: Railway station by the sea: The railway on the Lower Weser . HM Hauschild, Bremen 2006. ISBN 978-3-89757-343-7 .
- Anja Benscheidt, Alfred Kube: Bremerhaven and Geestemünde. Historical views of two competing port cities . Bremerhaven 2010. ISBN 978-3-86918-045-8 .
Remarks
- ↑ The half-timbered bridge in the course of Georgstraße spanned the entrance to the Geestemünder Bahnhof (until 1914) and the Geestemünde freight yard (from 1947). Georgstrasse and Weserstrasse became Reichsstrasse 6 in 1934 . The truss bridge was replaced by a wide prestressed concrete bridge (without tram) between 1960 and 1963.
- ↑ The Hoebelstrasse takes its name from Theodor Hoebel , the builder of the fishing port.
Individual evidence
- ^ Map of Lehe, Bremerhaven and Geestemünde (Meyers 1905)
- ↑ a b c d Walter Bollen: Fish course wagons secured delivery. This is how quickly sea fish traveled inland by train . Men from the Morgenstern Heimatbund at the Elbe and Weser estuaries V. (Ed.): Niederdeutsches Heimatblatt, No. 697, pp. 1–2
- ^ Museum Railway Bremerhaven – Bederkesa e. V.
