Köslin city and beach tram

Köslin city and beach tram
Course book range :	113z (1934)
Route length:	20.31 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system :	600 V  =
Legend Ostseebäder Großmöllen Nest Beach Courtyard Nest Beach courtyard Großmöllen Hotel Böttcher dairy Granary Großmöllen train station Depot Big Streitz Güdenhagen junction Güdenhagen Dore Güdenhagen Stadthof Horst-Wessel-Strasse Augustenthal cameling Augustenthal Buchwaldstrasse Depot Mścice – Mielno Koszalińskie Köslin main station Gartnerstrasse Marketplace Wood market Hindenburgplatz Braunplatz Schützenstrasse Poznan Street Ernest-Sachse-Strasse Gollenwald Lindenstrasse General-Litzmann-Strasse Kyffhäusersiedlung Rogzow Gallstone

In the Pomeranian city ​​of Köslin ( Koszalin in Polish ) and its surroundings, there was an electric rail network for several decades, which was operated under the name of Köslin City and Beach Railway. This emerged from two originally independent transport companies.

history

Kleinbahngesellschaft Güdenhagen – Groß Möllen

It all started with a small train that was supposed to make it easier for the people of Köslin to get to the resorts on the Baltic coast. At the end of the 19th century, horse-drawn buses were used for excursions from Köslin to the Baltic Sea. The vehicles with a capacity of 14–20 people carried around 500–600 people on good days, but that was not entirely sufficient. Since 1899, the Altdamm-Colberger Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, which was nationalized in 1903, had a railway connection from Köslin to Güdenhagen via the Köslin - Kolberg route , from where a five to six kilometer walk was due. When the line was being built, the communities of Groß Möllen , Streitz and Nest tried to establish a rail connection to Köslin, which failed. In order to provide the city with a connection to the Baltic Sea, the city and the Köslin district as well as a number of other investors founded the small railway company Güdenhagen – Groß Möllen GmbH . Most used material was used for the construction. About three kilometers of the 5.1-kilometer route ran on a separate track . The company opened on 15./18. August 1905 the standard gauge line from Güdenhagen to Groß Möllen.

The small railway company, which also operated freight possessed except a used tank locomotive of one type T no other vehicles. The KED Stettin of the Prussian State Railways took over the transport services , it provided the locomotive and train staff as well as the passenger cars. The trains always started in Köslin Hauptbahnhof , the journey time to Groß Möllen was around 30 minutes. The operation by the state railway turned out to be very expensive, a cessation of operations was out of the question in view of the fixed capital. The city therefore commissioned the technical works in Köslin to set up a calculation for the electrification of the railway, taking into account a connection to the tram that opened in 1911. On June 22, 1913, the railway ceased operations because it was incorporated into the Kösliner Strandbahn.

Urban electric tram to Koslin

Around 1910, the city of Köslin applied to host the Pomeranian trade, industrial and agricultural exhibition. For this purpose, the establishment of a transport connection from the main train station to the exhibition grounds at Gollenwald was planned. The Imperial Cadet Institute, which is also located there, promised sufficient utilization of the line beyond the end of the exhibition. The power supply was drawn from Belgard via a 3,000-volt three-phase line , for which four transformer stations were set up in the city . The city was able to win over the director of the trams of the city of Berlin , Dietrich, to develop the project.In the spring of 1911, construction work began, and on December 4, 1911, the district president of Köslin, Drews , granted the concession for the construction and operation of the railway at 99 Years. This went into operation on December 21, 1911 on the 3.3-kilometer route from the main train station to Gollenwald.

The line was single-track with six switches and was carried out in standard gauge . From the start of operations until 9:00 a.m. and from 8:30 p.m. to the end of operations, the train ran every ten minutes, and every five minutes during the day. Seven railcars and four sidecars were available for the opening . In the first full year of operation, 1912/13, the railway carried 958,408 passengers.

Köslin city and beach tram

When economic problems arose soon after the opening of the urban tram at the Güdenhagen - Groß Möllen railway, the solution of which was in the interests of the city of Köslin, the city bodies decided to extend the electric railway from the city center to the Baltic coast. The previous small train should be included in this new rail connection. After the state police acceptance on June 29, 1913, the beach lift was opened on July 1, 1913 to Groß Möllen. On July 13, 1913, the extension from Groß Möllen to Nest followed, which was initially served by a shuttle car. The district president granted the concession on December 10, 1913 for 99 years on the condition that the beach tram was more efficient than the steam train. Starting from the state train station, it followed the road to Güdenhagen for around seven kilometers as a tram, then used the previous small railway line via Streitz to Groß Möllen for about five kilometers and extended it - again as a tram - by 2.5 kilometers to the new end point in the seaside resort of Nest . Originally it was planned to relocate the line to its own railway body, which failed due to the high land acquisition costs and lack of space in Güdenhagen. The district administration of Köslin therefore made the proposal to use a summer path along the Kolberger Chaussee. In order to be able to continue using this as a path, the sleepers were dug so far that only the rail heads protruded. Within Güdenhagen, the track ran at the edge of the road, behind it it switched to the small railway line. The rail connection between the beach tram and the Güdenhagen state train station remained in place for freight car transfers and was provided with an overhead line . The points in this section were given lengthened wheel guides and padded frogs.

The new name of the company, which was run as a municipal company, was Kösliner Stadt- und Strandbahn , the operators were the Technischen Werke Köslin. Together with the previous tram, the rail network now covered a length of 17.39 kilometers; this also included the one kilometer long connection from Güdenhagen station to the village of Güdenhagen, which is now only used for goods traffic. There were a total of ten turnouts that allowed a 20-minute cycle on the beach tram. The fleet of wagons of the Strandbahn initially comprised four two-axle railcars, two four-axle closed sidecars and four summer cars , plus a total of 13 freight and baggage cars and an electric locomotive . In the opening year, in view of the large number of passengers - the Strandbahn already carried twice as many passengers as the Kleinbahn in 1913 - four four-axle railcars and four sidecars each were ordered again. In the first year of operation, the beach trams drove along the route of the light rail to the market. Since this increased the susceptibility of the tram to delays, the terminus of both lines was moved back to the main train station. The travel time for the 14.1 kilometer route from the train station to Nest was around 50 minutes. In addition to passenger transport, the railway was also used to transport goods and mail . On market days, so-called fish transport trains drove through to the market in Köslin, where the fresh fish was offered. The train, consisting of a motor car and a trailer, also carried a freight car for the fish baskets. An additional ticket had to be purchased for one full or two empty fish baskets.

Around 1912/13, a naval airfield of the Imperial Navy was built east of the Nest terminus . The extension of the beach tram to Nest was probably due to the construction of the air base, since sidings for the transport of materials are said to have led from the terminal stop to the military site. According to the provisions of the Versailles Treaty , the complex had to be closed after the First World War. The barracks served as a holiday camp for Berlin children during the Weimar Republic . In 1930, the expansion of the field railway tracks began on the site, and the air base is said to have been rebuilt from 1931.

During the hyperinflation at the beginning of the 1920s, the light rail system generated a deficit of 635,000 marks up to July 1, 1922 , and the beach tram generated a deficit  of 35,000 marks. The light rail then stopped operating on October 1, 1922. The regional council as the supervisory authority forbade the beach lift to operate. On April 15, 1924, the light rail went back into operation. Despite the difficult post-war conditions, a 2.8-kilometer branch line of the tram from Danziger Strasse to the neighboring town of Rogzow was opened on June 1, 1926 , but its trams usually began at the station like the older line. This meant that there were two tram lines and the beach tram, on which the larger four-axle vehicles were mainly used. There were no line numbers, the lines to Rogzow and Gollen were marked with red and green headlamps in the dark. The track length after the extension was 20.31 kilometers, the track length 21.5 kilometers. In the operating year 1929/30, the railway recorded the highest transport performance in its history with 2,121,313 people.

While before the First World War the train spacing was reduced to a 20-minute interval in the summer season, the German course book from the summer of 1934 (Table 113z) shows that departures were made every hour on the hour at both end stations, on Sundays in July and August even every half hour. The trains took 50 minutes for the whole route and crossed every hour in Güdenhagen.

1938: Buses replace the tram

Between 1931 and 1933, the Stadtbahn took half of its railcars out of stock. This was probably associated with a thinning of the timetable, which in turn caused a decrease in the number of passengers. By 1937, the transport performance had dropped to 1.2 million passengers. The opening of a municipal bus service on June 25, 1934 or June 1, 1935 led to further declines, even though the first line, as a supplement to the city railway, ran a north-south route in the city center. On February 1, 1937, the two light rail lines were replaced by omnibuses. There were now three urban bus routes on which twelve omnibuses were used. Finally, on September 30, 1938, operations on the beach tram also ended. As a substitute for this, a postal service ran. The timetable for the summer of 1939 only contained ten to twelve bus routes in each direction. However, they only needed 26 minutes for the whole route.

Since the Second World War

After the Second World War , when Western Pomerania came to the Polish state, the line was not dismantled. Initially, the Soviet Army maintained military installations in the former Nest air base, which were connected to the rail network through the route. When the Soviet Army was replaced by the Polish Air Force , the railway line was also used for civil traffic.

Around 1992 a section of the line was electrified. But as early as October 1, 1994, rail traffic was initially stopped. In summer 2008, seasonal traffic was temporarily started. In the period from July 18, 2008 to August 31, 2008, trains with diesel locomotives ran 16 times a day.

→ Main article : Mścice – Mielno Koszalińskie railway line

vehicles

The rolling stock of the Stadtbahn initially comprised seven two-axle railcars (Tw 1-7) and four identical two-axle sidecars (Bw 11-14). Gottfried Lindner AG in Ammendorf took care of the car body , the electrical equipment came from AEG . Since the sidecars were only needed during the exhibition, but there were no railcar reserves for a five-minute cycle, the sidecars 11 and 12 were converted into railcars in 1913. With the construction of the beach tram, the fleet was expanded to include four two-axle railcars (Tw 21-24) as well as two closed (Bw 30-31) and four four-axle summer cars (Bw 32-35). The vehicles came again from Lindner. Since the use of summer cars on the dusty roads gave rise to complaints, they began to be fitted with closed car bodies shortly afterwards . For the initially existing shuttle service between Groß Möllen and Nest, a second-hand two-axle railcar (Tw 25) was purchased; the origin of the vehicle is unknown, similar vehicles were in use at the time on the Elberfeld – Cronenberg – Remscheid tram and the Siegener Kreisbahn . Shortly after it opened, the good demand on the beach tram led to the order for additional vehicles from the Wismar wagon factory , which in 1914 delivered four large four-axle powered vehicles (15-18) and sidecars (36-39); the railcars were equipped with maximum bogies .

Other vehicles included an electric locomotive from Siemens-Schuckertwerke (Tfz 8) acquired second-hand from Siemens-Güterbahn near Berlin , a salt car (Wg 9), a tower lorry (Wg 10), a baggage car (Wg 19), a mixed baggage car. and mail wagons (Wg 20), an explosive unit (ATw 40), four gondolas (Wg 41–44) and two baggage carts (Wg 45–46). The status of another four freight cars has not been clarified; they may have been in the possession of the Prussian military and were procured for Nest Air Base. Another freight car (Wg 47) is said to have been added to the inventory in 1934.

By 1927, railcar 25 was probably taken out of stock. Between 1931 and 1934 the railcars and trailer cars delivered in 1911 were parked, only railcar 2 remained as a work car until 1937 . Her whereabouts are unclear. The majority of the vehicle fleet was sold to the scrap dealer Eckardt & Co. in Hamburg after the business was closed . The Wismar railcars and converted summer cars came via this detour to the network of the Upper Silesian Kleinbahn , three of the two-axle Strandbahn railcars as work vehicles for the Munich tram and the remaining sidecars for the Magdeburg tram . The two-axle beach tram railcar 23 is said to have been used as a towing car in the freight transport to the rebuilt air base Nest. The locomotive came to the Nuremberg-Fürth tram and the explosive unit found its new home at the Mindener Kreisbahn . The further development of the remaining vehicles is unknown; most of them were probably scrapped.

Vehicle fleet

number	Construction year	Manufacturer	Sit / stand	Power (in hp)	Remarks
1-7	1911	Lindner / AEG	16/14	2 × 35	two-axle railcars; 1931 Tw 2 to ATw, others retired; 1937 ATw 2 retired
8th	1905	SSW	-	2 × 35	two-axle locomotive; 1913 ex Siemens-Güterbahn Berlin, 1938 to Eckart, 1939 to Nuremberg locomotive 82
9	1913		-	-	Salt cart ; 1938 to Eckardt
10	1911		-	-	Tower car
11-14	1911	Lindner	16/14	-	two-axle sidecar; 1913/14 Bw 11–12 converted to Tw 11–12; 1931 Tw 11-12 retired; 1934 Bw 13-14 retired
15-18	1914	Wismar / AEG	42/18	2 × 56	Maximum railcar; 1938 to Eckardt, 1939 to Kattowitz Tw 135-138
19th	1913	Lindner	-	-	Baggage cart; 1938 to Eckardt
20th	1913	Lindner	-	-	Mail / baggage cart; 1938 to Eckardt
21-24	1913	Lindner / AEG	15/20	2 × 56	two-axle railcars; 1938 to Eckardt, number 23 to Nest Air Base; 1940 Tw 21–22, 24 to Munich ATw 61–63
25th				2 × 27	two-axle railcar, probably retired in 1927
(26–29)	1913	Lindner	-	-	Freight wagons for Nest Air Base, number assignment not certain, possibly. owned by the military
30-31	1913	Lindner	30/26	-	two-axle sidecar; 1938 at Magdeburg Bw 267 II -268 II
32-35	1913	Lindner	48/16	-	four-axle summer car; later closed; 1938 to Eckardt, 1939 to Kattowitz Bw 292–295
36-39	1914	Wismar	42/20	-	four-axle sidecar; 1938 at Magdeburg Bw ​​269 II -270 II
40	1913	Hellmer / AEG	-		Explosive units ; 1938 to Eckardt, 1938 to Mindener Kreisbahn Tw 301
41-42	1913	Lindner	-	-	two-axle open freight wagons (payload 10 t)
43-44	1913	Lindner	-	-	two-axle open freight wagons (payload 6 t)
45-46	1913	Lindner	-	-	Luggage carts
47			-	-	Freight wagons; Taken over in 1934

Depots

The depot was located north of the station on the west side of the state railway line to Stolp on Buchwaldstrasse. The carriage hall was 45 meters long and twelve meters wide. One of the four hall tracks was provided with a working pit. For the construction of the beach tram, the building was supplemented by an extension with three hall tracks. There was also a workshop and paint shop in the halls. The rectifier system was also located on the premises, initially with two converters with an output of 60 kilowatts. In Groß Möllen there was also a double-track storage hall 36 meters long and eight meters wide and with space for six four-axle beach tram cars. The old converters in Groß Möllen were used for the extension and two new single-armature converters with 100 kilowatts of power were installed in Köslin .

See also

• List of former German railway companies

literature

• Karl-Heinz Drewelow, Wolfgang Krüger: Trams in Pomerania . Bufe-Fachbuch-Verlag, Egglham 1989, ISBN 3-922138-36-5 .
• Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 7-12 .
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Günter Stetza: Memories of the Köslin tram . In: Tram magazine . No. 5 , May 1972, p. 74-76 .
3. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 12-22 .
4. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 25-35 .
5. ↑ Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 36-37 .
6. ↑ Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 37-38 .
7. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 38-44 .
8. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 49-50 .
9. ↑ ^{a b} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 45-48 .
10. ↑ Rita Scheller: As in the times of the emperor: The beach tram runs again from Köslin to Großmöllen . In: The Pommersche Zeitung . No. 41 , 2008, p. 7 .
11. ↑ ^{a b c d} Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 51-77 .
12. ↑ Jörn Müller, Rolf Roland Scholze: The Köslin city and beach railway . VBN Verlag B. Neddermeyer, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-941712-44-7 , p. 23-24 .