Rorschach-Heiden mountain railway

	SBB route from Romanshorn S 7
96.32	Rorschach Hafen end point S 25	398 m above sea level M.
	SBB route from St. Gallen
97.27 65.04	Rorschach end point S 7	399 m above sea level M.
	SBB route to Chur
64.42 0.00	SBB-AB ownership limit
	Parking facility
	Start of rack section
0.30	Former affiliation with Starrag (machine works)
0.31	Sea bleach	414 m above sea level M.
0.77	Sandbüchel	454 m above sea level M.
	Thalerstrasse
	A1 motorway
1.78	Waiting Lake	546 m above sea level M.
2.62	Wienacht Tobel	616 m above sea level M.
3.70	Schwendi b. Heathens	671 m above sea level M.
	Bahnhofstrasse, Heiden – Thal
	Depot Heiden
5.60	Heiden end point S 25	794 m above sea level M.

The Rorschach-Heiden-Bergbahn is a railway line in northern Switzerland . The former operating company of the same name, abbreviated RHB , went into the Appenzeller Bahnen (AB) in 2006 . Built by the RHB route is 5.60 km long standard gauge - cog railway from Rorschach at Lake Constance in the nearly 400 meters higher elevation Gentiles .

Route

The property line begins a good half a kilometer east of the Rorschach train station, shortly after it branches off from the Rorschach – Chur line belonging to the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) . The property line is exactly at kilometer 64.41483. The entry signal from Heiden to the Rorschach train station is at kilometer 64.476. This position is often incorrectly stated as the property limit, but in fact it is the operational limit. The property line between SBB and AB and the zero point of the kilometers in the direction of Heiden are behind the SBB depot, directly in front of the two points in the Appenzeller Bahnen parking facility. The rack also begins immediately after the two switches. The gradient that begins afterwards is on average 91 ‰, the maximum value is 93.6 ‰. Above Wienacht-Tobel the route is a little flatter and only reaches 79.6 ‰.

The route continues via the stations Seebleiche , Sandbüchel , Wartensee , Wienacht-Tobel and Schwendi bei Heiden to Heiden. All intermediate stations are demand stops . The terminal station in Heiden is at an altitude of 794 meters. The trains to Heiden already start at Rorschach Hafen station, initially following a piece of the Romanshorn – Rorschach railway line operated by SBB to Rorschach station and from there the route towards St. Margrethen to the junction.

The route runs through the political communities of Rorschacherberg (Seebleiche, Sandbüchel), Thal (Wartensee), Lutzenberg (Wienacht-Tobel), Heiden (Schwendi) and Grub (without a station) and ends in the municipality of Heiden.

history

Share for CHF 500 in the Rorschach-Heiden-Berbahngesellschaft from June 6, 1874

The first efforts to establish a rail connection for Heiden began in 1871. Early plans for an adhesive railway were soon discarded in favor of the rack-and- pinion line to Rorschach. After receiving the concession in January 1874, construction work began in the spring of the same year. After a year and a half of construction, the line was ready. It was built in such a way that an extension to Trogen was possible. That was specified by the Swiss Federal Assembly. The line was opened on September 6, 1875. The entire route was 7,163 m long when the company opened, of which 5,784 m were owned by the railway company. The construction costs of the line amounted to CHF 2,225,000, the costs for the rolling stock amounted to CHF 218,200. At the beginning, the railway company had three steam locomotives , nine passenger cars with a total capacity of 400 people and eight freight cars with a total capacity of 56 t.

The connection to the Chrennen quarry on the Siegfried map from 1903. Black and white: main line. Red: connection.

In 1897 the company was issued a concession allowing the construction of a junction of its line of km. 2.666 to a quarry in the “Chrennen” (then “Krinnen”) near Wienacht. For this purpose, a new track with a length of around 250 m was laid, which became an integral part of the entire railway system.

Since 1930 it has been electrified with the same power system as the SBB network, with single-phase alternating current 15,000 volts and a frequency of 16.7 Hertz.

With retrospective effect on January 1, 2006, the 2006 General Assembly resolved to merge with Bergbahn Rheineck-Walzenhausen (RhW), Trogenerbahn (TB) and the former Appenzeller Bahnen (AB). The four railways now operate under the name Appenzeller Bahnen.

Due to declining frequencies and a cost recovery rate of less than 30 percent, the cantons of Appenzell Ausserrhoden and St. Gallen have an engineering office checked in 2019 whether for the three cogwheel railways of the Appenzeller Bahn from Rorschach Hafen to Heiden, from Altstätten Stadt to Gais , and from Rheineck to Walzenhausen "More customer-friendly and cheaper alternatives" would be feasible. A switch to bus operation or fully automatic operation is under discussion.

Train operation

history

The truck manufacturer Saurer built a “rail mobile” to run low-traffic trains, which was tested in the winter of 1908 on the RHB. The safety regulations prevented commissioning on the rack line.

For the first two years, the trains had to be transported from the end of the rack in Rorschach to the Rorschach station with a third-party steam locomotive, whereby the RHB steam locomotive, which was only driven by a gearwheel, was towed the 560 meters. Since it was dependent on the goodwill of the then VSB , it was decided to equip its own locomotives with an auxiliary adhesion drive. Thus, from 1877 onwards, it was possible to reach Rorschach train station on one's own. Soon the trains were extended to Rorschach Hafen in order to pick up passengers directly from the steamers. This type of operation has been retained to this day, although today the tourist-oriented connection between ship and rail is of secondary importance compared to the needs of local commuting.

Until the delivery of the BDeh 3/6 in 1998, the RHB offered two car classes . This was the second and third class until the class reform of 1956, and the first and second class until 1998.

For a long time, the rack railway had a brisk volume of goods, as there was a siding to the Starrag machine factory near today's Seebleiche station and a grain mill in Wolfhalden, about 200 m from Heiden train station. Normal freight wagons can be transported on the route, as it allows all wagons of the UIC / RIC design to be transported, but only as individual wagons for weight reasons. Until the mill was shut down, wagons weighing up to 90 tons were delivered. In the end, these had to be delivered between two BDeh 2/4 using the “sandwich process”, since after a change in the regulations only a front load of 73 tons was permitted.

present

BDeh 3/6 25 in Rorschach Hafen

Today there is an hourly train in each direction between Rorschach Hafen and Heiden. The clock times in the morning differ from those after 9:00 a.m.

In the summer, public steam rides are also offered, with the former Rosa plant locomotive coming onto the route. The historic summer wagons are used in regular operation, a bicycle wagon is used to transport bicycles.

Freight traffic no longer takes place, with the exception of our own construction trains, as the main customers Starrag and Grain Mill Wolfhalden have ceased to exist. During the reorganization of Swiss freight traffic, many service points with lower freight volumes, including all of the RHB, were discontinued.

The motor car BDeh 3/6 25 was from September 2009 to May 2010 for revision in the main workshop of the Rhaetian Railway in Landquart. As part of this revision, it was repainted in the current colors and given the AB logo.

The Rorschach-Heiden-Bergbahn is included in the Ostwind tariff association.

Incidents

On December 1, 2002, an extra train crashed into a buffer stop in Wienacht-Tobel because of an incorrectly set point. 38 passengers suffered injuries.

Rolling stock

Steam gear train with H 2/2 3
ex Maschinenfabrik Rüti
Railcar BDeh 2/4 24 in Heiden

model series		Manufacturer	Construction year	origin	number of pieces		Discarded	Remarks
series	Numbers	Manufacturer	Construction year	origin	total	today	Discarded	Remarks
Locomotives
H 1/2 HG 1/2	1	Aarau	1875		3	0	1949
	2-3	Aarau	1875		3	0	1930
	4th	SLM	1900		1	0	1949
H 2/2	3 ^II	SLM	1951	Rüti (1997)	(Ex)0 1	hist. 1		"Pink"; ex MF Rüti H 2/2 3; Property EV
Railcar
BCFZm 2/2	21st	SLM	1910		1	0	1917	at RVT sold
FZeh 2/4 DZeh 2/4	21-22	SLM / MFO	1930		2	2
BCFeh 2/4 ABDeh 2/4	23	SLM / BBC	1953		2	2		remotely controllable with Bt 31
BCFeh 2/4 ABDeh 2/4	24	SLM / BBC	1967		2	2		remotely controllable with Bt 31
BDeh 3/6	25th	STAG	1998		1	1		Radio remote control
Control car
Bt	31	SLM / BBC	1962	BT (1985)	(Ex)0 1	0	2017	ex BT ABt 142; at EV sold
Passenger coaches
BC	1-2		1875		2	0	1930	open summer carriages
B ₂	3-7		1875		6th	5		open summer carriages
B ₂	8th		1875		6th	5	1970
C ₂	9		1875		1	0	1994	Conversion to D ₂ 9
D ₂	9		1875/1994		(At)0 1	0	2017	ex C ₂ 9; Velotransportwagen; at EV sold
B ₄	10 ^II -11 ^II		1962	SBB (1971)	(Ex)0 2	2		ex SBB B 8202-8203 (aluminum box EW I )
FROM ₂	12-13	SIG	1930		2	2
B ₄	14 ^II	SIG	1948	World Cup (1974)	(Ex)0 1	1		ex WM B 25
tractor
Tmh 2/2	20th	SLM / BBC	1962	KUMA (2006)	(Ex)0 1	1		ex MF Rüti 4, KUMA Thm 237 916
Ub = takeover from outside stock (used vehicle); Um = conversion from our own stock

Company car

X 152 (1859/1935) SCB / RHB, snow plow
X 257, 262, 264 (1898) flat wagons (from the M4 SP 252–264 series)
X 602, 603, 631, 641 formerly MThB
X 633
X 9054 formerly BT

gallery

BDeh 3/6 25 in Rorschach Hafen (paintwork variant before 2010)
BDeh 3/6 25 in Wienacht-Tobel
A train - consisting of a railcar, a bicycle car and three summer carriages - exiting the Heiden terminus
Entrance to the Heiden train station
Riggenbach rack and pinion track and turnouts in Heiden
Heiden station
Railway track detail