Frankensteiner Kreisbahn

Silberberg – Heinrichau / Kurtwitz
Course book range :	130d (1939)
Route length:	49.89 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Maximum slope :	25  ‰
Minimum radius :	200 m
Legend from Reichenbach 12.71 Silver Mountain (Srebrna Góra) to Wünschelburg 9.13 Schönwalde Bz. Wroclaw 7.47 Ober Peterwitz 5.38 Peterwitz (Stoszowice) Gross Olbersdorf 0.0 Frankenstein (Ząbkowice Śląskie) Schweidnitz – Kamenz railway line 1.97 Protzan (Zwrócona) 6.13 Nickel works 7.61 Tomnitz 10.11 Kobelau 14.66 0.0 Lauenbrunn (until 1936 Tepliwoda , Ciepłowody) Siegroth South 3.06 Siegroth 5.49 Siegroth Nord (until 1937 Wonnwitz ) 7.00 Schmitzdorf - Silbitz 10.35 Great Kniegnitz from Heidersdorf 12.52 Kurtwitz (Kondratowice) after Strehlen Ratz 18.52 Tarchwitz 20.59 Old Heinrichau from Wroclaw 24.65 Heinrichau (Henryków) to Kamenz

The Frankensteiner Kreisbahn-AG was founded on March 25, 1907 as Frankenstein-Münsterberg-Nimptscher Kreisbahn-AG , as it operated until January 7, 1937.

history

The Kingdom of Prussia, the districts of Frankenstein , Münsterberg and Nimptsch as well as the railway construction and operating company Lenz & Co GmbH , which took over the management of the entire network on November 1, 1908 and held it until 1945, were involved in the company. The almost 50 km long standard-gauge small railway network was mainly located in the district that was enlarged in 1932. The Strehlen district was only ten kilometers away .

In the Silesian district town of Frankenstein , the small train station was located near the state train station, which was located on the state railway line Schweidnitz - Kamenz running along the north-eastern edge of the Owl Mountains . It was a terminus with two connections. A 13 km long stretch to the west reached the town of Silberberg, where it was connected to the Owl Mountain Railway . The other opened up the north of the district and ended after 25 km in the small train station of Heinrichau on the state railway line Breslau – Kamenz – Glatz. In the middle of this longest small railway line branched off in Lauenbrunn, which was called Tepliwoda until 1937, another 12 km long connection to Kurtwitz on the Strehlen – Heidersdorf branch line.

The distribution of the share capital had changed only slightly by the beginning of World War II. The Prussian state had the largest share with 25%. The Frankenstein district accounted for 16%, the neighboring districts of Reichenbach and Strehlen a total of 9.2% and the city of Frankenstein 11.7%. After the AG for Transport had sold its 26% stake in 1940, more than a third was in free float. In 1937 the railway was renamed Frankensteiner Kreisbahn-Aktiengesellschaft .

In the first few years before the First World War, a 3% dividend could be paid. Passenger traffic was pretty good until 1927, after which it sank. A diesel multiple unit purchased in 1936 brought no improvement. In freight transport, agricultural goods determine the volume of traffic. There was also a mine and a basalt quarry as customers.

When it opened, there were five Lenz type c locomotives; in 1929 two brand-new ELNA 2 were purchased, and two old locomotives were sold for them. In 1940 there were four steam locomotives, one railcar, eleven passenger cars, three packing cars and 29 freight cars.

Operation after the Second World War

After the war, the Polish State Railways continued operations. Only one locomotive survived the war, the others remained lost. From July 14, 1946, two trains ran daily between Frankenstein and Silberberg and as far as Tepliwoda / Lauenbrunn. Diesel locomotives were used from 1964. Passenger traffic between Ząbkowice Śląskie (Frankenstein) and Srebrna Góra (Silberberg) was stopped on May 21, 1977, freight traffic on July 15, 1983. On January 1, 1987, passenger traffic between Ciepłowody (Tepliwoda) and Henryków (Heinrichau) was stopped, the rest of the passenger traffic on September 1, 1989. On January 1, 1991 freight traffic was discontinued.

literature

• Siegfried Bufe: Railways in Silesia. Bufe-Fachbuch-Verlag, Egglham et al. 1989, ISBN 3-922138-37-3 . (= East German Railway History , Volume 4.)
• Jörg Petzold: Frankenstein-Münsterberg-Nimptscher Kreisbahn. In: Die Museumseisenbahn ( ISSN  0936-4609 ), issue 1/2008 , pp. 22–28.

Web links

• Documents and newspaper articles on the Frankensteiner Kreisbahn in the press kit of the 20th century of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .