Industrial railway of the St. Egidien nickel smelter

St. Egidien – Callenberg North

Maximum slope :

40 ‰

0.00	Start of the route (ore hall)	310 m
0.22	Bunker bridge
0.30	St. Egidien Werkbf [Stw B2]	310 m
2.80	BÜ Berggasse (St. Egidien)	354 m
3.90	Lobsdorf depot [Stw B3] (Lobsdorf turnout)	370 m
4.75	SÜ Lobsdorfer Straße (S245) (Hintergrumbach)	382 m
4.80	SÜ federal motorway 4
5.65	EÜ Am Kiefernberg ( Grumbach )	379 m
5.85	SÜ Bundesstrasse 180	374 m
6.30	Opencast mine Callenberg Süd I (1960–1977)
	Abzw Gleisdreieck
6.50	Opencast mine Kiefernberg Nord (1964–1965) and opencast mine Callenberg Süd II (1985–1990)
6.55	Obercallenberg depot [Stw B4] (mine station)	360 m
6.75	EÜ Road of Peace ( Reichenbach )
7.50	BÜ Grumbacher Strasse (Reichenbach)	354 m
8.20	Callenberg depot [Stw B5]	337 m
8.25	Opencast mine Callenberg Nord I (1972–1988)
9.15	BÜ Altenburger Strasse (S248) (Callenberg)	334 m
9.40	Ore body 7 (1985–1988)
9.80	BÜ Spielsdorf	326 m
9.90	Erlbach passage
10.50	Callenberg Nord depot [Stw B6]	320 m
10.55	Opencast mine Callenberg Nord II (1978–1990)
11.20	End of the route

The industrial railway of the St. Egidien nickel smelter was a narrow-gauge ore railway with a 900 mm gauge in Saxony . It led from the St. Egidien nickel smelter to the Callenberg nickel deposits . In its greatest extent, the ore railway network reached a length of ten kilometers.

history

Ore train in the Callenberg opencast mine (1982)

Map section with the former route of the industrial railway in the area of Callenberg

Ores were already being mined in the vicinity of Callenberg at the end of the 14th century, and nickel iron stone was mined in the Oberwald itself since the 17th century. However, mining came to a standstill in the 18th century. Another dismantling was planned after the First World War , but did not materialize. When the bismuth was looking for pitchblende here after the Second World War , a large nickel deposit was discovered instead.

Since the GDR initially primarily promoted heavy industry , there was a great need for appropriate additives for steel production. Therefore, the first opencast mine near Callenberg was opened around 1950 and a nickel smelter was to be built. The site north of the St. Egidien train station was chosen as the location for this , as it was easy to establish a railway connection to the Dresden – Werdau line . An ore railway was supposed to transport the nickel ore from the open-cast mines about three kilometers away to the nickel smelter. In 1959/1960 an initially 6.2 km long mine railway line with a 900 mm gauge was built from the Callenberg Süd I opencast mine near Reichenbach , which was connected to the Obercallenberg mine station via a track triangle, to the nickel smelter in St. Egidien. In addition to three massive overpasses and two bridges, it also received modern signal boxes based on the prototype of the Deutsche Reichsbahn at the time. The Obercallenberg / Reichenbach mine station received a locomotive shed, purification, coaling and water takeover systems. The transport was carried out using one-sided box tipping wagons with a capacity of 25 m³ each. In 1960, VEB Lokomotivbau Karl Marx Babelsberg purchased six steam tender locomotives as train locomotives . There was also a factory track with a 600 mm gauge and movable tracks for transporting overburden within the opencast mines. Its 40 wagons were much smaller and had a capacity of 6 m³. In 1960, the St. Edigien nickel smelter went into operation at the same time as the narrow-gauge railway. After the line was initially only used by steam locomotives, the line was electrified and six EL 3 -E locomotives were used in 1961/62 . The industrial railway network had increased in the 1980s to almost 12 km with a total of six signal boxes due to the branch lines to the Callenberg South II opencast mine and to ore 7 as well as the extension to the Callenberg North II opencast mine . The exploration of the Kiefernberg Nord opencast mine between Reichenbach and Falken, which began in 1964, including the expansion of the mine railway, was discontinued the following year and the siding dismantled.

The smelting of nickel ore in the St. Egidien nickel smelter had to be stopped on September 12, 1990 due to damage to the last furnace in operation. In the last two active opencast mines, Callenberg Süd II and Callenberg Nord II , ore mining and regular train operations ended on October 8, 1990. On June 3, 1991, the last train journey to transfer wagons to the mine yard took place. By the mid-1990s, the line was completely dismantled after the plans of an interest group for tourist use or even an extension to the Muldentalbahn to Waldenburg had failed due to funding. Most of the vehicles were scrapped, parts of the track material were still used to build the Schönheide museum railway . In 1992 the mine station in Obercallenberg was designated as an industrial monument, but this was lifted two years later. On January 9, 1995, the facilities at the Obercallenberg depot was torn down. On the former area on the dam of the Oberwald reservoir between Reichenbacher Straße in the west and Bergstraße in the east, there is now a large parking lot and a wooded area. Nearby, two wagons on a piece of track remind of the time of the ore railway. A railway bridge is still preserved in Grumbach . The signals can still be found at the former bridge in Reichenbach. Furthermore, the foundations of the overhead line masts have been preserved on parts of the railway line that has been preserved to this day. An exhibition about the time of nickel ore mining can be found in the Reichenbach cultural meeting place.

Relics of the industrial railway of the St. Egidien nickel smelter

Railway embankment between Kuhschnappel and Lobsdorf (2020)
Foundation of the overhead line masts between Kuhschnappel and Lobsdorf (2020)
Overpass Lobsdorfer Straße in Hintergrumbach (2020)
Former railway bridge in Grumbach (2019)
Overpass B180 in Reichenbach (2020)
SÜ B180 in Reichenbach with relic of the overhead line (2020)
Remnants of the ore railway wagon at the Oberwald reservoir (2020)
Slopes of the railway bridge Strasse des Friedens in Reichenbach (2020)
Signal remnants at the former railway bridge Strasse des Friedens in Reichenbach (2020)
Embankment near Reichenbach with remnants of the catenary foundation (2020)
Route at the former level crossing at Grumbacher Strasse near Reichenbach (2020)
Railway embankment near Reichenbach (2020)
Railway embankment near Spielsdorf (2020)