North-South route
The north-south line is the name given to the railway connection from Hanover via Göttingen , Bebra and Fulda to Würzburg , including a branch line to Frankfurt am Main .
After the end of the Second World War until the opening of the largely parallel high-speed line from Hanover to Würzburg , it was the most important and busiest connection of the former German Federal Railroad between northern and southern Germany.
Today, the operation of the north-south route is mainly characterized by freight traffic , but it also serves regional traffic , while long-distance passenger traffic has mainly been shifted to the high-speed route Hanover – Würzburg .
Importance and operation
Until 1945
The individual routes were not insignificant, but there was no significant through traffic from Hanover via Bebra and Fulda to Frankfurt or Würzburg. Most of the north-south traffic to Frankfurt ran via Kassel and the Main-Weser Railway , while traffic to Bavaria also ran via Leipzig or Halle and the Saalbahn .
1945 to 1991
The north-south route became one of the most important supply routes for the US troops from their seaport in Bremerhaven . South of Eichenberg , the route briefly ran across Thuringian territory, which belonged to the Soviet occupation zone . As a result of the Wanfried Agreement , the entire north-south route was ultimately west of the inner-German border . As a result of this agreement, the north-south route was also given the name “ whiskey-vodka line ” in this area .
It thus became a western bypass of the GDR and had to take over the traffic previously handled via the Saalbahn and other routes further east, up to connections such as Copenhagen - Vienna , which previously ran via Rostock , Dresden and Prague .
North-south traffic grew rapidly in the 1950s. For long- distance passenger transport, the German Federal Railroad increasingly preferred the faster connection via Göttingen, Bebra and Fulda compared to the Main-Weser-Bahn , which in return took over freight transport. Kassel was thus largely cut off from long-distance passenger traffic and only connected with individual long-distance trains and feeders to Göttingen and Bebra .
The connection was massively expanded, in particular it was electrified in 1963. Where it was technically possible, the speed was increased to up to 160 km / h: between Gelnhausen and Hanau since the 1990s even to 200 km / h in sections. In other places ( Eichenberg , Bebra , ...) it was not even possible to reach 100 km / h.
Since the 1960s it was clear that the existing routes would be permanently overloaded and too slow. With the introduction of intercity traffic in the interval timetable from 1979, the capacity problems worsened. In 1988 the southern section between Fulda and Würzburg was opened first, and in 1991 the northern section from Hanover to Fulda of the high-speed line Hanover-Würzburg was opened.
Development since 1991
The Intercity-Express traffic to Würzburg changes to the high-speed route south of Hanover. The trains in the direction of Frankfurt continue to run from Fulda on the old line, which in sections has been expanded to become a high-speed line. The section between Bebra and Fulda is also used by the ICE trains on the east-west connection between Dresden and Frankfurt am Main.
To the north of Göttingen, Intercity trains ran every two hours until December 2009 (successor to the former Interregio trains) with various stops in between. Since December 2009, these trains have also been running between Hanover and Göttingen on the high-speed line; only three trains in rush hour have remained on the old line.
History and course
The north-south route combines several historically grown railway lines (or parts of them). It mainly runs through the sparsely populated Central German layered landscape and follows some curvy river valleys.
Hanover - Göttingen
The section to Göttingen is part of the Hanover Southern Railway in 1854 , which connected the two capitals of Hanover (from the Kingdom of Hanover ) and Kassel (from the Electorate of Hesse ). Important intermediate stops are Alfeld (Leine) , Kreiensen and Northeim . This section runs largely flat in the Leinetal .
Göttingen - Bebra
After the annexation of Hanover and Electoral Hesse by the Kingdom of Prussia in 1866, the Prussian State Railways created several connections between the existing lines.
First, in 1867, a branch line of the Hanover Southern Railway from Göttingen continued through the Leinetal via Friedland (Han) to Arenshausen on the Halle – Hann railway line. Münden built.
The next important goal was Bebra , there met the Bebra-Fulda railway to the railway Bebra-Baunatal-Guntershausen . The construction of this route from Friedland via Bad Sooden-Allendorf and Eschwege turned out to be more difficult and was not completed until 1876.
Significant gradients had to be overcome at Eichenberg and Cornberg , and a total of four railway tunnels were necessary to get from the Leine valley first to the Werra valley and its tributaries, the Wehre and Sontra , and from there to the Fulda valley .
Bebra - Elm
This railway line was created in 1868 to connect the Hessian cities of Hanau , Fulda and Bad Hersfeld as well as the free imperial city of Frankfurt am Main to the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Nordbahn. At Bad Hersfeld the route leaves the valley of the Fulda , as this area belonged to the Grand Duchy of Hesse .
From Fulda the ridge had to be overcome, and the route from Flieden led to a hairpin in Elm . From there the route runs down to Schlüchtern in the Kinzig valley and follows the river Kinzig via Gelnhausen to Hanau and on to Frankfurt am Main.
With the construction of the Schlüchtern tunnel under the thistle lawn , the route between Flieden and Schlüchtern was shortened in 1914, while the hairpin in Elm was no longer needed.
Elm - Gemünden
Like the railway line between Göttingen and Bebra, this section was only created in 1872 after the unification of the empire. In Elm, it connects to the old route of the Frankfurt-Bebraer Bahn and thus turned the former switchback station into a separation station. Since the section between Flieden and Elm has only been used by trains in the direction of Gemünden since the tunnel was built, the route between Flieden and Gemünden is now viewed as a unit.
Between Elm and Jossa , the route with a very winding and tunnel-rich route leads first along the upper reaches of the Main-Kinzig and then down into the valley of the Sinn . It follows this until it flows into the Main near Gemünden .
Gemünden - Würzburg
From Gemünden via Karlstadt to Würzburg , north-south traffic uses the Würzburg – Aschaffenburg railway in the Main Valley (opened in 1854).
literature
- Federal Railway Directorate Hanover: 1843–1983. 140 years of the Hanover Railway Directorate. Hanover undated (1983).