Royal Saxon State Railways
The state-owned railways in the Kingdom of Saxony were called the Royal Saxon State Railways , or K.Sächs.Sts.EB for short , from 1869 to 1918 . From November 1918 until it was incorporated into the Deutsche Reichsbahn , which was founded in 1920, they were known as the Saxon State Railways .
history
Way to the state railway
After the privately financed Leipzig-Dresden Railway was built in 1839, the Saxon state parliament began to work on railway construction. It was recognized early on that rail lines to Bavaria, Bohemia and Silesia were necessary and that a north-south route should run through the kingdom. The financing of the project was in the hands of privately financed railway committees. However, the state felt compelled to set the appropriate political and legal course. On January 14, 1841, a contract was signed with the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Duchy of Saxony-Altenburg to build a railway line from Leipzig to Hof . On June 22, 1841, the Saxon-Bavarian Railway Company was founded , and on September 19, 1842, the railway between Leipzig and Altenburg was opened. Since the construction costs of the railway line Leipzig – Hof exceeded the planned framework, the state had to step in, which took over the Saxon-Bavarian Railway Company and thus fulfilled its previously given promise to complete the construction. On April 1, 1847, the railway line, which was completed as far as Reichenbach in the Vogtland , became state property.
The administration was carried out by the new Royal Direction of the Saxon-Bavarian State Railroad in Leipzig. Regulations were established by the state parliament. The directorate was given appropriate powers and was directly subordinate to a ministry. The payroll of the civil servants had to be approved by the state parliament, the railroad tariffs approved the stands . In addition to financing the construction of the railway, in particular the Göltzschtal and Elstertal bridges , agreements had to be concluded with Saxony-Altenburg and Bavaria on ownership and operating conditions. On July 15, 1851, the line to Hof (Saale) was completed.
Since no acceptable private company had been found for the construction of the Saxon-Bohemian Railway from Dresden to Bodenbach , the state itself took on this task. With the opening of the Dresden – Pirna section on August 1, 1848, Saxony had its second state railway, for which the Royal Direction for the construction and operation of the Saxon-Bohemian State Railway was set up in Dresden .
On July 24, 1843, a contract was signed with the Kingdom of Prussia to build a railway line from Dresden via Bautzen to the Prussian cities of Görlitz and Bunzlau . This made it possible to establish the important connection to Wroclaw .
On September 1, 1847, the private “Saxon-Silesian Railway”, completed with state support, opened the 102 km Dresden – Görlitz line. On January 31, 1851, this company became the property of the state. At the same time, the management of the private Löbau-Zittau railway company was taken over. By merging the two routes from Dresden under one line, savings should be achieved. The "Royal Direction of the Saxon-Bohemian and Saxon-Silesian State Railways in Dresden" was formed, which was renamed from December 14, 1852 into the "Royal State Railroad Direction to Dresden".
On December 31, 1850, the “Royal Directorate of the Chemnitz-Riesa State Railroad” was established. It had the task of completing the construction of the Riesa – Chemnitz railway line and carrying out operations. This became necessary after the private, state-sponsored Chemnitz-Riesaer Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft went bankrupt due to expensive engineering structures between Waldheim and Döbeln .
In contrast to Prussia, a railway law was never passed in Saxony. This meant that every railway project had to be decided in the state parliament. Despite the negative experiences in the past, state railways were built increasingly over the next ten years. The construction work was mostly problematic due to the geographical difficulties. In particular, the extension of the line between Chemnitz and Riesa and the line from Freiberg to Tharandt were technically demanding and correspondingly expensive.
On November 15, 1858, the line from Chemnitz to Zwickau was completed. Thus there was a connection from Riesa to the Saxon-Bavarian Railway via the connection from Zwickau established in 1845. Because of this, the Chemnitz management was dissolved and the routes it managed were transferred to the Leipzig management. This was named "Royal Directorate of the Western State Railway". At the same time, the Dresden management called itself "Royal Directorate of the Eastern State Railways" around.
In 1862 the state railways had a route length of 525 km. In addition to the Leipzig-Dresden Railway , there were also private coal railways in the Saxon hard coal areas of Zwickau and Döhlen as well as the Zittau-Reichenberger Railway . However, the latter was also state-owned in 11/12.
Connections from Leipzig to Corbetha and Bitterfeld and thus connections to Magdeburg and Berlin as well as the Voigtland State Railway ( Herlasgrün - Eger ) were established by 1865 .
The German War of 1866 between Prussia and Austria turned out to be a turning point in railway operations . Since Saxony was on the side of the Austrians, the locomotives to Hof, Eger and Budapest were brought to safety when the Prussian troops marched in. The Ostrava Viaduct and the Riesa Elbe Bridge were destroyed as part of the war . In the subsequent peace treaty, Prussia was awarded the Silesian Railway and Görlitz railway station on its territory. A Prussian route from Leipzig to Zeitz also had to be approved.
In the following years the route network was further expanded. Lines into the upper Erzgebirge were now also created after Schwarzenberg / Erzgeb. The railway connection was connected to Annaberg in 1866 and Weipert in 1872 . The most important reason was the import of brown coal from the North Bohemian Basin . In 1869, the gap between Flöha and Freiberg was finally closed , so that the two route networks were connected,
On July 1, 1869, the Leipzig and Dresden directorates were dissolved and merged into the new "General Directorate of the Royal Saxon State Railways" in Dresden with the announcement of June 17, 1869.
General director of the Saxon State Railways was u. a. the real privy councilor Otto von Tschirschky and Bögendorff , the father-in-law of the later General Paul von der Planitz .
Further development
The years after the founding of the empire in 1871 were also marked by a large number of private railway construction projects in Saxony. In most cases, however, the state had to come to the rescue to complete the planned routes and to continue operating them. In addition, there were other own construction measures to expand the route network. With the railway construction it was possible to promote the underdeveloped areas and z. B. to settle in the villages of the Ore Mountains and the Lausitz industrial companies. On July 1, 1876, the state took over the Leipzig-Dresden Railway, thereby expanding the route network by 337.5 km. As a result, almost all of the still private railway companies in Saxony were taken over in order to be prepared for an intended Reich railway project under Prussian leadership.
Since the construction and operation of the railways was not always covered by the income, the search for simplifications began. As early as 1865, the technicians' assembly of the Association of German Railway Administrations had drawn up principles for secondary railways. These were implemented in legal principles in 1878 with the Railroad Regulations for German Railways . The routes that were created with these facilities were called secondary railways in Saxony . 26 lines with 453 km were operated as secondary lines with immediate effect and in 1879 the first newly built secondary line went into operation with the Leipzig suburban line Plagwitz-Lindenau-Gaschwitz .
Since the secondary railways did not always produce the desired savings, construction of the first narrow-gauge railways began in 1881. On October 17, 1881 the section between Wilkau and Kirchberg was opened. By 1920 the Saxon narrow-gauge railways had a length of 519.88 km.
The most important station buildings were the Dresden Central Station from 1891 to 1901 and the Leipzig Central Station, completed in 1915 . Both construction measures involved extensive reconstruction of the railway systems in the cities.
With the abdication of King Friedrich August III in November 1918 . and the conversion of the kingdom into a free state was no longer called “royal” and the railway administration in Saxony was called “Sächsische Staatseisenbahnen”, or “Saxons” for short. Sts. EB ". In 1920, the Saxon State Railways added 3,370 kilometers of routes to the Deutsche Reichsbahn. Administratively, the Saxon State Railways became part of the Dresden Reichsbahndirektion , which continued until the rail reform came into force in 1994.
Route network
The route network included the north-south connections from Leipzig via Plauen to Hof, from Riesa to Chemnitz and from Elsterwerda to Dresden and Schöna, and the east-west connections from Plauen via Chemnitz to Dresden, from Leipzig to Dresden and from Dresden to Görlitz. In particular, the industrialized Ore Mountains were opened up by several branch lines along the river. In places these routes crossed the Ore Mountains and established connections to the Bohemian route network.
An overview of the individual routes can be found in the list of railway lines of the Royal Saxon State Railways .
Traction vehicles
Steam locomotives
The first locomotives procured were already mature types of English production, namely machines with two coupled axles of type B and later locomotives of type 1B. Type 1A1 locomotives were also initially purchased.
Locomotives with the 1'B wheel arrangement were (technically advanced) built and used for a relatively long time. For freight train service and for operations in the mountains, there were C couplers from the 1850s. From the end of the 1860s, type 2'B locomotives ( classes VII and VIIIb1 ) were built for express train service . On the branch lines and in the shunting service, the B-couplers were the dominant design for a long time.
From the 1890s onwards, the general management began to adapt the newly acquired locomotives more to the various purposes (freight and passenger trains or express trains). The different route profiles (flat in the north and northeast, mountainous in the south and southwest) increasingly demanded different constructions. From the turn of the century, new genres were introduced faster and faster. The 2'C locomotives were followed by types with the axle sequences 2'C1 '( XVIII H ) and 1'D1' ( XX HV ) in express train service; 1'C1 '( XIV HT ) in local traffic and 1'D ( IX H ) and E ( IX V and XI HT ) in freight train service.
The development of the narrow-gauge locomotives was similar in stages. After or parallel to the 44 C couplers of the later type I K , two designs followed that were not entirely convincing and were therefore procured in small numbers (later types II K and III K). With the development of the Meyer type B'B'-locomotive , a design was created which, from 1892, later became the IV K class , formed the backbone of the Saxon narrow-gauge locomotive park for decades. Starting in 1901, the four-axle VK type supplemented the inventory in a small number. After the First World War, the General Management took the opportunity to purchase 15 brand new five-axle narrow-gauge locomotives built by the Henschel & Sohn company in Kassel for the military railway service. The Sächs.Sts.EB included these locomotives in the class VI K in their inventory.
While the private Leipzig-Dresden Railway procured its locomotives from several English and German locomotive manufacturers, the majority of the locomotives of the state railways were developed and supplied by the Chemnitz- based Sächsische Maschinenfabrik, formerly Richard Hartmann AG.
Railcar
Up until 1920, railcars were only used to a limited extent on the routes in Saxony. The only regular and long-term use took place with electric multiple units on the narrow-gauge railway Klingenthal – Sachsenberg-Georgenthal . On the regular track, tests were carried out with steam railcars, battery railcars and internal combustion engine railcars. Three Thomas-type steam railcars from 1883 were used for a longer period of time. Two diesel-electric railcars acquired in 1915 proved themselves in service, but were sold to Switzerland after the First World War .
An overview of the individual locomotive types can be found in the list of Saxon locomotives and railcars .
dare
In addition to own developments, designs from Prussian freight cars were also adopted with a few changes. After the establishment of the German State Car Association in 1909, the standardized association freight wagons were procured, which were defined by a total of 11 sample sheets. A tabular overview can be found in the chapter on standards .
Trams
From 1891 onwards, private investors planned several interurban trams that should run from Dresden to the surrounding communities. The Saxon state, however, mostly refused the corresponding concessions because it feared a competitive situation with the already existing parallel railway lines. However, since the railroad could not cope with the increasing volume of traffic, the state finally began building its own tram routes shortly before 1900. The first line of this type was the Lößnitzbahn from Mickten to Kötzschenbroda , which opened in 1899 . Later there were routes to Hainsberg (1902), to Klotzsche (1906), to Weißig (1908) and to Cossebaude (1911).
The state tram routes were administered by the Royal Saxon State Railways. The operation of the routes was carried out by the two companies Deutsche Straßenbahngesellschaft in Dresden and Dresdner Straßenbahn AG on behalf of the state railway.
When the Saxon State Railways were absorbed by the Deutsche Reichsbahn in 1920 , the state tram lines remained in the possession of the now Free State of Saxony . On April 1, 1926, they became the property of Dresdner Überland-Verkehr GmbH , which in turn became part of Dresdner Straßenbahn AG in 1941.
Bus lines
In 1913 the Royal Saxon State Railways set up their first bus and coach routes . In particular, important cross-connections between the railway lines were served, for example between Selva and Olbernhau or Rodewisch and Johanngeorgenstadt . In addition, routes were also used where railway construction had already been planned but had not yet been approved.
The municipalities served by the lines had to provide the car halls and workshop rooms required for operation and waive compensation for the use of their routes. In addition, they had to pay for the necessary depreciation of the car if it was not covered by fare income. In July 1914, 254 kilometers of state motor vehicle lines were in operation, and another 500 kilometers were in preparation. Fares were five pfennigs per kilometer.
After the establishment of the Deutsche Reichsbahn in 1920, the lines were taken over by the state-owned Kraftverkehrsgesellschaft Freistaat Sachsen AG (KVG Sachsen).
Web links
- The Royal Saxon State Railways in the Dresden City Wiki
- www.sachsenschiene.de
- Remembering what has been created
literature
- Arthur von Mayer: History and geography of the German railways . Berlin 1894 (reprinted by Moers 1984).
- Fritz Näbrich, Günter Meyer, Reiner Preuß: Lokomotiv-Archiv Sachsen . transpress, Berlin 1984.
- Erich and Reiner Preuß: Saxon State Railways . transpress, Berlin 1991, ISBN 3-344-70700-0 .
- Johann Ferdinand Ulbricht: History of the Royal Saxon State Railways . Leipzig 1889, Reprint Leipzig 1989, ISBN 3-7463-0171-8 ( digitized edition 1889 Uni Cologne ), ( digitized edition 1889 SLUB ).
- Manfred Weisbrod: Saxony Report Vol. 1 + 2 Saxon Railway History . Hermann Merker Verlag, Fürstenfeldbruck 1993 + 1995, ISBN 3-922404-12-X and ISBN 3-922404-71-5 .
Individual evidence
- ^ Rainer Fischer, Sven Hoyer, Andre Marks, Joachim Schulz: Die Wagen der Sächsischen Schmalspurbahnen, Volume 2, SSB Medien, Zittau 2017, ISBN 978-3-00-055550-3 , pp. 16ff.
- ↑ the laws and ordinances of the Kingdom of Saxony, 10 pieces of 1869. Announcement No. 48 the new State Railway Administration and the establishment of a General Direction of the Royal Saxon State Railways etc. on June 17, 1869, p 159. digitized , accessed on 9 September 2019. The claim that is often found in secondary literature that a Royal General Directorate of the Saxon State Railways was formed is not covered and is probably a mistake that relates to Karl-Ernst Maedel: Die Königlich Sächsische Staatseisenbahnen , Franckh'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung , Stuttgart 1977, p. 16, left column, as currently the earliest known evidence.
- ^ Dresdner Verkehrsbetriebe AG (ed.): From coachmen and conductors - the 135-year history of the Dresden tram . Junius Verlag, Dresden 2007, ISBN 978-3-88506-018-5 , pp. 43, 93.
- ^ Railway map of the Kingdom of Saxony, October 1913 ; Drawn in general techn. Bureau of the Royal. Saxon. State Railways
- ↑ Saxon Railways. In: Viktor von Röll (ed.): Encyclopedia of the Railway System . 2nd Edition. Volume 8: Passenger tunnel - Schynige Platte Railway . Urban & Schwarzenberg, Berlin / Vienna 1917, p. 294 (detailed).