Rurtalbahn GmbH

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Rurtalbahn GmbH
Logo of the Rurtalbahn GmbH
Basic information
Company headquarters Düren
Web presence www.rurtalbahn.de
Reference year 2019
owner 74.9% RATH GmbH
25.1% Beteiligungsgesellschaft Kreis Düren mbH
Supervisory board Wolfgang Spelthahn (Chairman) and 5 others
Managing directors Sebastian Nießen
Herbert Häner
Georg Beyß
Transport network AVV
Employee 90 (2018)
sales 16.753 million euros (2018)dep1
Lines
Gauge 1435 mm ( standard gauge )
railroad 3
number of vehicles
Railcar 8 Stadler Regio-Shuttle RS1
3 Alstom Lint 54
statistics
Passengers 1.1 million per year
Mileage 898,700 km (2018)
Stops 35
Operating facilities
Track length 102 km

The Rurtalbahn GmbH is a non-federally owned railway company , based in Dueren . It belongs to 25.1% of the holding company Kreis Düren (formerly Dürener Kreisbahn ) and 74.9% of RATH GmbH, a medium-sized family company.

The name Rurtalbahn was first used as a brand by the rail department of the Düren district railway . The rail transport company, which was spun off as an independent company on January 1, 2003 with the participation of RATH, then took over the name.

The Rurtalbahn is not a member of the tariff association of federal and non-federal railways in Germany (TBNE).

passenger traffic

history

Düren, March 3, 1993: The last DB train before the 3-hour morning break has arrived from Jülich, on the right there are overhauled rail buses waiting for the DKB
RegioSprinter in Düren, October 4, 1996: Left (platform 23) DKB train 7944 Jülich - Heimbach, right (platform 22) train 8535 Düren - Jülich

On May 23, 1993, the Düren district railway took over the operation of the Jülich – Düren and Düren – Heimbach lines from the Deutsche Bundesbahn . With the start of operations, the timetable has been significantly improved compared to the Bundesbahn. An hourly service with modernized Uerdingen rail buses ( VT 98 ) was introduced on the two branch lines , the timetables of the bus routes in the district were largely coordinated with the cycle times of the Rur Valley Railway, and an on-call bus or shared taxi system was also used for areas with low traffic density built up. Since the Düren Kreisbahn, in contrast to the DB, was already a member of the Aachen Transport Association , the two rail lines were also included in the association. For example, for a combined bus-train-bus journey from Linnich via Jülich train station and Düren train station to downtown Düren, a single ticket was sufficient. New stops have been set up on the two railway lines, the operating times have been significantly extended in the mornings and evenings, and trains are now running on the Jülich line again on Saturdays and Sundays after more than 20 years of weekend rest. Some of the Jülich weekend trains were tied through to Heimbach in order to create an attractive range of leisure traffic along the Rur and its hiking and cycling routes. However, the direct connections had to be discontinued in 1999 due to the reconstruction work of the DB at Düren station.

After two years of operation, the Dürener Kreisbahn was able to modernize its vehicle fleet in 1995 with 16 completely newly developed, high- speed RegioSprinters . These diesel railcars were equipped with 74 permanently installed seats, 10 folding seats and some hanging devices for bicycles. The final stock of 17 vehicles was quite generous for the two routes to be operated, which is why some RegioSprinters have been loaned out to various other transport companies over the years.

On June 7, 2002, passenger traffic was reactivated from Jülich to Linnich , a section of the formerly continuous Jülich – Dalheim railway line . The trains from Düren will continue to Linnich without having to change trains. In the 2004 and 2005 summer seasons, the Rurtalbahn ran tourist traffic on Sundays on the Oleftalbahn from Kall via Gemünd to Schleiden .

Rurtalbahn regional shuttle at Heimbach station, 2012

Since the Rurtalbahn's RegioSprinter no longer appeared up-to-date after a number of years due to a lack of air conditioning and toilet facilities and, in contrast to the previously usual, very durable railway vehicles, were only designed for a service life of around 20 years, initial plans were made in 2008 for a renewal of the Vehicle fleets added. After test drives with Alstom Coradia LINT and Bombardier Itino railcars , an order for five Stadler Regio-Shuttles RS 1 worth € 8.85 million was finally placed in 2010 . In November 2011, the delivery of the railcars began; the trains have the company's internal designation VT 740 to VT 744. The multiple units purchased were bought by the Dürener Kreisbahn and are leased to the Rurtalbahn. In the tender for the Rurtalbahn line RB 21 in 2016, the applicants were asked to take over the multiple units. The Rurtalbahn won the tender. Thereupon they acquired three more multiple units of the Regio-Shuttle RS1 from the East German Railway , which operate with the internal company designation VT 745 to VT 747.

LINT 54 of the Rurtalbahn at the Blens stop, 2019

In 2016, the Rurtalbahn ordered three Alstom Coradia LINT 54 diesel multiple units for twelve million euros . These arrived in Düren on March 31, 2017 and each offer 160 seats and 170 standing places. The barrier-free trains increase comfort by being equipped with air conditioning, sockets, a toilet and space for luggage and bicycles. Since July 2017, the three newly ordered LINT 54 locomotives with the internal designations VT 211–213 have been in service for several months on the north branch of Düren – Linnich . Initially, the susceptibility of the new multiple units to faults caused many delays, but this problem was resolved by the end of 2017. In addition, the timetable on the northern line was changed in order to improve the connection situation in Düren station .

With the use of the LINT 54 multiple units, the use of the RegioSprinter largely ended, but the Rurtalbahn initially kept some RegioSprinter as reserve trains. On February 25, 2019, the last RegioSprinters left the Düren district on their way to the Czech Republic, where they had been sold and where they will continue to be operated in a modernized form.

On November 25, 2018, the control and safety technology on the Düren – Jülich line was renewed for over eight million euros. In order to be able to act more flexibly on the route, the interlockings from the 1990s in the Krauthausen , Jülich and Linnich stations were taken out of service and replaced by a modern electronic interlocking . Furthermore, the tracks in Krauthausen have been extended so that longer trains can cross there. Previously, this was only possible in Jülich. At the same time, the line was equipped with six new level crossings on the north branch. The 85-meter long An den Aspen stop was built by December 9, 2018 and has been approached by the Rur Valley Railway since then in order to create a better connection to the Jülich school center.

The Rurtalbahn also operated for the IG Rurtalbahn e. V. the Bördeexpress , which ran from Düren via Zülpich and Vettweiß to Euskirchen and in December 2015 merged with the Eifel-Bördebahn (line RB 28) ordered by the Rhineland Local Transport Authority. Until the timetable change on December 15, 2019, the Bördeexpress only ran every three hours on Saturdays and Sundays. Since then, this line has also been operated by the Rur Valley Railway every two hours during the week.

Todays situation

On the north branch of Düren-Linnich, the Rur Valley Railway runs every hour in both directions. During rush hour, however, there is a half-hourly service between Düren and Linnich in both directions. The travel time from Düren to Linnich is 34 minutes. On the southern section of Düren – Heimbach, the Rur Valley Railway also runs every hour. Mondays to Fridays from 5:20 a.m. to 7:35 p.m., there is a half-hourly service in both directions on the section between Düren and Untermaubach-Schlagstein. The travel time from Düren to Heimbach is 46 minutes.

On the Düren – Linnich and Düren – Heimbach routes , the Rurtalbahn uses locomotives of the Regio-Shuttle RS 1 and LINT 54 types .

Since December 15th, the Rurtalbahn has been operating the Eifel-Bördebahn between Düren and Euskirchen, which emerged from the Bördeexpress, every two hours in both directions. A Regio-Shuttle RS 1 locomotive is used. The journey time from Düren to Euskirchen is 51 minutes.

The Rurtalbahn has a 50% stake - in addition to DSB Germany, a subsidiary of the Danish State Railways - in the Vias railway company based in Frankfurt am Main , which operated the 210-kilometer network of the Odenwaldbahn in southern Hesse from December 11, 2005 to 2015 . Three districts and the cities of Frankfurt am Main and Darmstadt were touched on five lines . VIAS has been operating the Rheingau line between Neuwied and Frankfurt since December 2010. VIAS Rail GmbH, a company wholly owned by RATH, has been operating the services in the Odenwald network since 2015. This company also took over the operation of the North Rhine-Westphalian lines RB 39 (Düsseldorf – Bedburg) and RB 34 ( Mönchengladbach – Dalheim ) at the timetable change in December 2017 . The latter had previously been used by the DKB and the Rurtalbahn on behalf of DB Regio since the late 1990s .

With the timetable change in December 2019, the Rurtalbahn took over the preliminary operations on the Bördebahn. This is used on the Düren – Euskirchen railway line every day at approximately 2 hours. After the completion of the expansion of the Bördebahn, which began in 2019, the travel time is to be reduced from one hour to around 34 minutes, which means that six pairs of journeys per day are possible.

Freight transport

Rurtalbahn diesel locomotive with coal train at the new siding of the Jülich sugar factory, 2006
RTB Cargo electric locomotive with ARS Altmann car train in Hungary, 2013

From 1993 to 2010, the Rurtalbahn GmbH or its forerunner Dürener Kreisbahn also operated goods traffic, initially only in the Düren area. From the beginning, considerable amounts of wagons ran to the paper mills in Lendersdorf and Linnich, later also to Zülpich, and from 2004 to the Jülich sugar factory. Due to the increasing freight volume, the Rurtalbahn expanded in the freight transport business in 2006 with a stake in the Belgian Trainsport AG and in 2007 with the establishment of the Rurtalbahn Benelux B.V. in the Netherlands. Since 2007, the Rurtalbahn has been active as a transport company beyond its home region throughout Germany and also operates internationally as a rail transport company. The Rurtalbahn cooperated with other logistics companies in the development of fixed transports on the main freight transport axes. In 2008, it was decided to outsource freight transport from the Rurtalbahn and to found a new, independent company for freight transport. In October 2010, RTB Cargo was founded with headquarters in Aachen.

A specialty is the occasional transport of large transformers, which are brought to Niederzier-Krauthausen via the Rur Valley Railway and are then reloaded onto heavy-duty road transporters. These transports have taken place very rarely over the decades, however, due to the construction of the ALEGrO high-voltage direct current line in the nearby Oberzier substation , four such transports occurred in the course of 2019. However, the Rurtalbahn is only involved in these transports as a railway infrastructure company; companies that specialize in such transports act as railway companies.

Route network

As a railway infrastructure company (EIU), the Rurtalbahn operates 35 stations and a 102-kilometer route network. The following routes belong to this network:

The Lindern – Heinsberg route with its seven stations is owned by WestVerkehr , the remaining 90 kilometers of the route network with 28 stations are 100 percent owned by the Düren district holding company .

The Jülich - Puffendorf line is no longer in operation these days. A reactivation of the route is not planned in the near future. After the Rurtalbahn acquired the Jülich – Dalheim line, the Jülich – Linnich section was reactivated on June 7, 2002 . At a price of 860,000 euros, the Rurtalbahn also bought the Düren – Zülpich section of the Bördebahn on December 19, 2002 , which was then operated by DB Netz .

In 2011, the previous Huchem-Stammeln stop on the Düren – Linnich line was expanded again over a length of two kilometers to a double-track station. With the change in the Deutsche Bahn timetables in June 2009, the connection to the trains in Düren was no longer ensured with the previous crossing of trains in Krauthausen station. Initially, the completion of the measure was planned by the end of 2010, but there were delays due to a longer plan approval process , so that it was postponed by half a year. However, the planning was changed again and the expansion was finally completed when the timetable changed in December 2011.

Others

Otmar-Alt-Sprinter of the Rurtalbahn on the Bördebahn in Vettweiß, 2011

The headquarters of the Rurtalbahn is on the Kölner Landstrasse in Distelrath . The main and operations workshop in the Distelrath station can be reached from the Düren station using the Bördebahn. The depot for passenger trains and shunting locomotives is also located here.

From the vehicle inventory of the Jülich Kreisbahn, which was transferred to the Dürener Kreisbahn in 1984, the Rurtalbahn still has the historic Taunus type Talbot railcar , which is intended for use in museums. It was completely refurbished in 2010 and then completed a number of special trips, especially on the southern route to Heimbach.

Another special feature in the vehicle fleet was the Otmar Alt Sprinter , which was converted from a regular RegioSprinter in 2002 by the Linnich artist Otmar Alt and which could be rented for presentations or special trips. It also frequently ran on the Bördebahn in the years when it was only operated on weekends. Like the other RegioSprinters, it was also sold to the Czech Republic in February 2019.

Expansion plans

  • To the north of Linnich, the railway line should possibly be extended to Hückelhoven-Baal . With the renovation of the north branch in the second half of 2018, the Rurtalbahn already laid some foundations for the future, including the new 85 meter (instead of 55 m) long platform between Jülich Nord and Broich called An den Aspen. The longer platforms are necessary in the course of a route extension, since longer trains would have to be used at the same time in order to be able to accommodate more passengers on the longer route.
  • The Bördebahn Düren - Zülpich - Euskirchen is to be expanded for passenger traffic, so that the journey time between Düren and Euskirchen is 34 minutes. Continuous passenger trains from Bonn via Euskirchen and Düren to Aachen are also under discussion .
  • The company aimed to build a container station in the Düren region. There were two variants, with the preferred location for a four-track container station on the Bördebahn in the municipality of Nörvenich near Rommelsheim . To this end, the Bördebahn from Düren to the planned container terminal should be electrified . Forwarding agents should be able to settle in the area. It was later discussed whether to build the train station in the Rurbenden industrial park in Huchem-Stammeln. Due to the lower development costs , however, the current plan is to build the container station at the Düren station on the high-speed route Cologne – Aachen . According to local politicians, the Rur Valley Railway, the seaports of Rotterdam and Antwerp and international logistics companies should also participate in the financing.

Because of the largely canceled infrastructure funds from the federal government and the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, all plans except for the container terminal and the reactivation of the Bördebahn have been postponed for the time being.

On June 28, 2012 it was announced that the Düren – Linnich line was to be electrified in 2013 for 6 million euros . The local public transport association for the Rhineland should assume the majority of the costs. In addition, an expansion of the railway infrastructure between Heimbach and Linnich was planned at 2.88 million euros. The measures should enable a switch to electric traction after the operation was awarded in 2016 and reduce noise pollution for residents. However, these measures have so far not been taken.

literature

  • Bernd Hahne: Always on the move - 100 years of the Düren circular path 1908–2008 . Düren 2008, ISBN 978-3-927312-93-7 .
  • Willi Hallmann: The Dürener Kreisbahn in the course of time and 10 years of the new Rurtalbahn . Hahne u. Schloemer, 2003, ISBN 978-3-927312-62-3 .

Web links

Commons : Rurtalbahn  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Annual report 2018 Rurtalbahn GmbH. In: Federal Gazette. Retrieved January 19, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Annual report 2017 Rurtalbahn GmbH. In: Federal Gazette. Retrieved September 29, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Annual report 2018 Rurtalbahn GmbH. In: Federal Gazette. Retrieved January 19, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Annual report 2018 Rurtalbahn GmbH. In: Federal Gazette. Retrieved January 19, 2020 .
  5. ↑ a b Participation report of the district of Düren 2009 (PDF; 191 kB)
  6. ↑ Multiple unit instead of regional sprinter. In: Aachener Zeitung. October 8, 2008, accessed October 8, 2008 .
  7. ↑ From 2011 air-conditioned towards Heimbach , Dürener Zeitung of August 17, 2009
  8. ^ Reinhard Gessen: Stadler Regioshuttle. In: Mining and railways in the Aachen-Düren-Heinsberg region. Retrieved November 3, 2018 .
  9. ↑ Kreis sets the course for new railcars , Aachener Nachrichten of June 29, 2009
  10. ↑ Rurtalbahn continues to operate the RB 21 North: New railcars. In: Aachener Zeitung. May 31, 2016, accessed November 3, 2018 .
  11. ↑ Additional funding on VT 213 A of the Rurtalbahn. In: Drehscheibe-online.de. April 3, 2017, accessed June 13, 2020 .
  12. ↑ Ruben Stüttgen: New timetable for the Rurtalbahn is supposed to bring improvements for commuters. In: Aachener Zeitung. December 12, 2017, accessed November 1, 2018 .
  13. ↑ Jörg Abels: Rurtalbahn: More comfort on the northern route. In: Aachener Zeitung. April 24, 2017. Retrieved November 1, 2018 .
  14. ↑ Sebastian Petermann: The (new) train is coming. In: myheimat.de. March 3, 2019, accessed March 6, 2019 .
  15. ↑ Moritz Lötzgen: The DUEWAG / Siemens RegioSprinter. In: Series654.de. Retrieved June 12, 2020 .
  16. ↑ Volker Uerlings: Rurtalbahn has to take a weekend break on the north branch. In: Aachener Nachrichten. November 14, 2018. Retrieved November 28, 2018 .
  17. ↑ Thomas Barthels: Bye Rurtalbahn ... Welcome VIAS. In: Railway in Mönchengladbach. December 17, 2017, accessed November 1, 2018 .
  18. ↑ Eifel-Bördebahn also runs on weekdays from December. Aachen Transport Association, July 15, 2019, accessed on September 29, 2019 .
  19. ^ Rurtalbahn GmbH: History. In: Company. Retrieved June 13, 2020 .
  20. ↑ Joëlle Bouillon: Transformer for ALEGrO converter comes to Niederzier. In: press releases. Amprion GmbH, June 7, 2019, accessed on June 13, 2020 .
  21. ↑ Rail network. Rurtalbahn GmbH, 2013, accessed on May 10, 2014 .
  22. ↑ Five million euros for the 2nd track , Dürener Zeitung of May 28, 2009.
  23. ^ Rurtalbahn reactivates station by the end of the year , Aachener Zeitung from June 29, 2010.
  24. ^ Expansion of the station is delayed , Aachener Zeitung from October 19, 2010
  25. ↑ Timetable measures 2011/2012 (PDF; 30 kB), Aachener Verkehrsverbund
  26. ↑ Around 4.5 million euros built in , Aachener Zeitung dated December 11, 2011 (accessed on January 13, 2012)
  27. ↑ Rurtalbahn now runs completely digitally from Jülich to Linnich. In: Aachener Nachrichten. Retrieved December 8, 2018 .
  28. ↑ New container terminal should be at the Düren station. In: Aachener Zeitung. December 14, 2011, accessed January 13, 2012 .
  29. ↑ Rur Valley Railway between Düren and Linnich is electrified. In: Aachener Nachrichten. June 28, 2012. Retrieved June 29, 2012 .