Local railway Retz – Drosendorf

Retz – Drosendorf

2043.53 on the road

Route number :

180 01

Course book route (ÖBB) :

941

Route length:

39,959 km

Gauge :

1435 mm ( standard gauge )

Maximum slope :

29 ‰

Minimum radius :

170 m

Top speed:

60 km / h

Legend

	from Wien Nordwestbf
0.000	Retz	245 m above sea level A.
	to Znojmo
2.019	EK B 35
	Hölzelmühle closed on November 8th, 1927
7.434	EK B 30
8.225	Hofern	416 m above sea level A.
9,999	Lower Fladnitz	422 m above sea level A.
	Alsenbach
14.353	Pleißing - Waschbach	384 m above sea level A.
17.881	Weitersfeld Lower Austria	429 m above sea level A.
	Fugnitz
22,800	Oberhöflein	424 m above sea level A.
23,707	Hessendorf's fishing paradise	440 m above sea level A.
24,700	Hessendorf
26,488	Langau	450 m above sea level A.
26.803	EK B 30
31,349	Geras - Kottaun	460 m above sea level A.
32,900	Johannesthal 29.05.1994 closed
	Thumeritzbach
35,153	Zissersdorf H-Lst	485 m above sea level A.
??,?	Maria Schnee pilgrimage church closed in 1938
39.835	Drosendorf	414 m above sea level A.

The local railway Retz – Drosendorf in the Weinviertel connects the cities of Drosendorf and Retz on the Nordwestbahn . After the cessation of passenger traffic on June 9, 2001, the route has been marketed for tourism by NÖVOG as a nostalgia train under the name Reblaus-Express since 2002 .

history

Prehistory and construction

Retz train station

The former screening plant in Langau

Drosendorf station

The city of Drosendorf tried to get a rail connection early on. For this reason, some route variants were planned and pre-licensed, none of which were implemented:

a standard gauge local railway from Frain an der Thaya via Drosendorf to Raabs an der Thaya (pre-licensed on July 1, 1897)
an electric train from Dobersberg via Karlstein an der Thaya to Drosendorf (pre-licensed on May 28, 1900)

On February 1, 1901, another pre- license was granted for a normal or narrow-gauge local railway on the Retz– Weitersfeld –Drosendorf route . The route revision was held on October 7th and 8th, 1901.

The Langau –Drosendorf section was originally intended to be routed via Wolfsbach and would have been four kilometers shorter. However, this project was rejected during the route revision. After the final financial details had been clarified, on July 27, 1908 , the regional committee of the Archduchy of Austria under the Enns was granted the concession to build and operate the standard-gauge local railway Retz – Drosendorf. It stipulated the completion of the railway within the next two years, i.e. by 1910.

Objections from the neighboring communities made frequent inspections of the planned route necessary. One of the points of discussion was the type of connection to the Nordwestbahn in Retz. The original plan was to build a new local train station across from the existing Nordwestbahn station building. This would have meant that the track of the railway leading to Drosendorf would have crossed the line leading to Znojmo . Finally, an agreement was reached on the execution of a junction that still exists today from the station area of the Nordwestbahn.

The building permit for the route from Retz to Drosendorf was issued on October 23, 1908, and on February 1, 1909, that for the station area in Retz followed. Construction began in October 1908. The bridges were tested on August 4th and 5th, 1910 and the technical police route test on August 16, 1910. Scheduled operations on the new route began on October 21, 1910 and were carried out by the Lower Austrian State Railways . After the statutes of the "Local Railway Retz – Drosendorf" had been approved on April 3, 1912 and the constituent general assembly of the new company took place, it was entered in the commercial register on August 13, 1912 . The operating company was from the beginning the Lower Austrian State Railways.

business

Regional train with a class 2143 locomotive and a mail car in Drosendorf (1991)

Zissersdorf stop and loading point

Timetable from 1994

From May 1, 1916, there was a stop near the Maria Schnee pilgrimage church between Zissersdorf and Drosendorf, which was only observed on certain days and was closed again in 1938.

The ostensibly positive accounts of the first few years of operation were put into perspective by the use of the state guarantee. The state railway received 119,045.04 crowns in 1912 ; 1913 106,663.27 crowns and 1914 99,727.67 crowns. The Drosendorf internment camp was probably one of the Deutsche Bahn customers during the First World War .

But this local railway also felt the economic problems of the post-war period. After the Niederösterreichische Landesbahnen got into severe economic turmoil due to the numerous loss-making railway lines, a contract was signed on July 15, 1922 between the state of Austria and the states of Vienna and Lower Austria , granting the republic the lease of all lines in Lower Austria. Landesbahnen retrospectively from January 1, 1921. On September 24, 1924, the railway finally became the property of the Austrian Federal Railways .

Paragraph 2 of the contract regulates z. B. ... immediately after the entry into force of this contract into the actual ownership of the railway line in the state as it is and is, including the real estate not entered in the railway book.

The Hölzelmühle stop between Retz and Hofern was closed on November 8, 1927. On January 1, 1935, the state finally took over the Retz – Drosendorf local railway; the liquidation of the stock corporation was completed on February 20, 1936. Between April 22, 1932 and October 3, 1933, the Johannesthal stop between Geras -Kottaun and Zissersdorf was temporarily closed, but later reactivated. On May 28, 1995, it was finally shut down.

After a test drive and a technical and police check, an increase in the maximum speed from 30 km / h to 50 km / h was approved in 1933. The next inspection took place on October 6th and 7th, 1933 with the aim of increasing the speed for the use of light railcars in some sections of the route to 70 km / h. However, this increase in the maximum permissible driving speed required investments in the production of larger viewing areas and technical safety systems at road crossings.

In connection with the construction of the railway line, a lignite depot was discovered between Langau and Schaffa (today Šafov ) in Moravia , but this was only dismantled after the Second World War and during this time the freight volume increased significantly. The kaolin mining company Mallersbach was also one of the customers . At the time of the Iron Curtain , when it was not possible to use the route of the Northwest Railway to Znojmo and further north, the ÖBB even ran some trains from the Vienna Praterstern station continuously to Drosendorf.

On June 10, 2001, passenger traffic on the entire route and goods traffic between Weitersfeld and Drosendorf were suspended. The last passenger train left Retz on June 9, 2001 at 19:25 and returned to Retz as an empty train.

Operation from 2002 and nostalgic traffic

Museum diesel multiple unit ÖBB 5042.14 in Drosendorf

RegioSprinter in the newly established Anglerparadies Hessendorf stop

Seasonal passenger traffic was continued on the weekends of the summer season between 2002 and the end of June 2006 on the order of the Province of Lower Austria as a nostalgic train under the name " Reblaus -Express". The area between Weitersfeld and Hessendorf was severely damaged by the heavy rainfall at the end of June 2006, and the phylloxera express was then shortened between Retz and Weitersfeld. With the start of the 2007 season, however, operations could be resumed as planned. The phylloxera express was then so well received that a third pair of trains was introduced from the first weekend in July and bus routes running in parallel were canceled. Since then, the Oberhöflein stop has not been served, but one stops in Zissersdorf.

The 100th anniversary took place on August 21 and 22, 2010. On the latter of the two days, in addition to the planned trains of the phylloxera express, a special steam train with the 52 100 drove from Retz to Drosendorf and back. In addition, a special stamp and a commemorative publication were issued.

Even after the route has been taken over by the state of Lower Austria, the phylloxera express will continue to run on weekends and public holidays between Retz and Drosendorf from the 2011 season. NÖVOG has been operating as the operator since December 2010 . The fleet remains the same ( series 2143 + frame wagon ). The NÖVOG rail bus unit will also operate on the route in March and April 2019 . The phylloxera express, together with the Waldviertel narrow-gauge railway, was the subject of the 757th episode of the television series Eisenbahn-Romantik .

Since the NÖVOG took over the route and stopped the remaining freight traffic between Retz and Weitersfeld in December 2010, the route was provided with a blocking shoe in December immediately after the entry signal before Retz until the beginning of the following season . This has now been removed.

Freight traffic between Langau and Retz was resumed on October 15, 2018. In cooperation with the local warehouses in Langau and Weitersfeld and the RWA with the railway companies regiobahn from Ernstbrunn, Grampetcargo Austria and the Wiener Lokalbahnen Cargo as well as the wagon rental company VTG , a concept was developed which enables the removal of grain from the warehouses in Langau and Weitersfeld in one 14-daily rhythm. This concept could also be extended to the removal of wood from the warehouses.

literature

Peter Wegenstein: The Northwest Railway Line. Verlag Peter Pospischil, Vienna 1995 ( Bahn in Fig. 91, ZDB -ID 52827-4 ).
Wolfdieter Hufnagl: The Lower Austrian State Railways. Transpress Verlag, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-613-71214-8 .
Gerhard Artl, Gerhard H. Gürtlich , Hubert Zenz: Between Waldviertel and Weinviertel. 100 years of the Retz-Drosendorf local railway. Verlag Fassbaender, Vienna 2010, ISBN 978-3-902575-34-0

Web links

Commons : Lokalbahn Retz – Drosendorf - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ Daily news. (...) New rail concessions. In: Wiener Landwirthschaftliche Zeitung. Illustrated newspaper for the whole of agriculture , No. 3193/1897 (XLVII. Year), August 4, 1897, p. 503, top left. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / wlz.
↑ Concession document of July 27, 1908 for the local railway from Retz to Drosendorf. In: Reichsgesetzblatt for the kingdoms and countries represented in the Reichsrathe , year 1908, RGBl. 1908/175, pp. 611-616. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / rgb.
^ According to press information from the operator , accessed on February 5, 2012.
^ NÖVOG: Spring trips of the Reblaus Express. Retrieved March 24, 2019 .
^ Eisenbahnromantik, episode 757 , accessed on February 5, 2012.
↑ Back on track: new opportunities for freight transport. In: noen.at. NÖN, October 17, 2018, accessed on December 11, 2018 .

48.763055555556 15.964722222222Coordinates: 48 ° 45 ′ 47 " N , 15 ° 57 ′ 53" E

[1] Daily news. (...) New rail concessions. In: Wiener Landwirthschaftliche Zeitung. Illustrated newspaper for the whole of agriculture , No. 3193/1897 (XLVII. Year), August 4, 1897, p. 503, top left. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / wlz.

[2] Concession document of July 27, 1908 for the local railway from Retz to Drosendorf. In: Reichsgesetzblatt for the kingdoms and countries represented in the Reichsrathe , year 1908, RGBl. 1908/175, pp. 611-616. (Online at ANNO ). Template: ANNO / Maintenance / rgb.

[3] According to press information from the operator , accessed on February 5, 2012.

[4] NÖVOG: Spring trips of the Reblaus Express. Retrieved March 24, 2019 .

[5] Eisenbahnromantik, episode 757 , accessed on February 5, 2012.

[6] Back on track: new opportunities for freight transport. In: noen.at. NÖN, October 17, 2018, accessed on December 11, 2018 .