Leinfelden – Waldenbuch railway line
| Leinfelden-Waldenbuch | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Route number (DB) : | 4863 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Course book section (DB) : | 318a | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Route length: | 11.702 km | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gauge : | 1435 mm ( standard gauge ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Leinfelden – Waldenbuch line , also known as the Siebenmühlentalbahn , was a branch line in Baden-Württemberg . It led from Leinfelden via Steinenbronn to Waldenbuch and mainly followed the Siebenmühlental . Sometimes it was also referred to as the Schönbuchbahn , although this name can actually be assigned to the older railway line from Böblingen to Dettenhausen . Today the so-called federal hiking trail runs along a large part of the route .
history
Prehistory and construction
In 1920 the city of Stuttgart took over the route network of the economically troubled Filderbahn company and had it operated by the Stuttgart trams (SSB). The standard gauge line to Neuhausen was supposed to be operated by the Deutsche Reichsbahn (DR) according to a contract , as it was not electrified and the other Filderbahn lines were narrow-gauge .
In order to run through trains from Neuhausen to Stuttgart without having to change to meter- gauge trains in Möhringen or Degerloch , the Deutsche Reichsbahn built the standard-gauge line from Rohr to Echterdingen in 1920 .
The construction of the line to Echterdingen called on the people of Waldenbuch to get the rail connection promised by the DR predecessor company. There was also a construction contract concluded with the Royal Württemberg State Railways for the route to Waldenbuch. Thus, the DR agreed to build this complex route after all. The construction work in the form of relief work began in May 1919, but they came through the inflation and lack of money to a halt.
In the 1920s, the Möhringen – Unteraichen – Leinfelden SSB connection was rebuilt in meter gauge when the line to Neuhausen could be reached from Vaihingen . Back then, the city of Stuttgart had plans to extend the meter-gauge tracks over the route of the Siebenmühlentalbahn via Waldenbuch to Tübingen . The goods traffic should be carried out with the help of trolleys . Thus the long-planned direct connection would still have been implemented.
However, the German Reich insisted on completing the ruins as a standard-gauge railway. In 1926 construction work was resumed, mainly at the instigation of the city of Waldenbuch. As with the Heubergbahn , which was built at the same time, they were intended as job creation measures. Furthermore, an unusually large number of viaducts were built for the time.
business
On June 23, 1928, the Deutsche Reichsbahn was able to open operations on the Siebenmühlentalbahn. It was reopened as one of the last lines in the German Reich. The long distances between the settlements and the stations were characteristic, only at the end point in Waldenbuch this was not the case.
From the very beginning, however, the railway was in direct competition with bus transport, so there had been a bus connection between Degerloch and Tübingen since 1911 . Later Kraftpost and train bus lines, which ran via Waldenbuch and offered shorter journey times, pulled passengers off the train. The sawmills and mills bought their own trucks and thus they lost their freight volume. Both passenger traffic and freight volume therefore always fell short of expectations.
Shutdown
On May 22, 1955 - almost 27 years after the opening - passenger traffic was stopped by the Deutsche Bundesbahn . Apart from routes that were destroyed in the war or affected by the division of Germany , the route was one of the first in West Germany to stop passenger traffic.
Soon afterwards, however, in July 1955, freight traffic to Waldenbuch had to be stopped because previous heavy rain had damaged the embankment between Burkhardtsmühle and Waldenbuch and the Deutsche Bundesbahn did not want to pay for the expensive repairs. On October 1, 1956, the Siebenmühlentalbahn was finally officially shut down, that is, it was de- dedicated . Only a short remaining section to Musberg was still served in freight traffic afterwards, but these trips were only made as required. The tracks and station facilities between Musberg and Waldenbuch were finally dismantled beginning on July 25, 1957. In 1972 the remaining line to the Musberg stop was also dismantled after it had been used as a siding for the Musberg community until October 1, 1971 .
Route description
course
The route of the Siebenmühlentalbahn began in the Leinfelden station, today a station in the network of the Stuttgart S-Bahn . As a crossing station, this linked the lines of the Reichsbahn with those of the Filderbahn. From there, the route headed west towards Musberg, using level crossings to cross Echterdinger Strasse and then Musberger Strasse. Immediately after the Musberg stop there was another level crossing over Filderstraße before the train reached the eponymous Siebenmühlental, which it followed in the further course.
About 500 meters after Musberg, the route reached the first viaduct, on which it crossed the Reichenbach, a tributary of the Aich , at the Mäulesmühle . 300 meters later the second viaduct followed over the Eschbach, before after another 300 meters at the Seebruckenmühle the road to Steinenbronn (old federal road 27 , today state road 1208) and the Kesselbach was crossed. The Steinenbronn train station was located at km 3.7. This was provided with a crossing and loading track . However, the station was about 500 meters as the crow flies and two kilometers from the actual location in the middle of the forest, which is why the frequency during operating hours of the railway was always low.
In the further course of the Siebenmühlental, the railway reached the Schlösslesmühle stop at distance kilometers 5.4 . Shortly before this station there was another level crossing, it led over the so-called Schweizer Straße . The next station was the Kochmühle at km 7.1 and finally the Burkhardtsmühle at km 9.6. Here the route left the Siebenmühlental and followed the Aichtal in a westerly direction, before reaching the Glashütte stop after 900 meters.
200 meters after the last intermediate station, the municipal road to Waldenbuch was crossed on a bridge in order to then reach the village of Waldenbuch at kilometer 11.7. The station had extensive tracks and a small locomotive station that was used to park the locomotive.
Operating points
The train stations and stops of the Siebenmühlentalbahn were categorized as follows:
| station | Station class |
|---|---|
| Leinfelden | IV |
| Musberg | V |
| Steinenbronn | IV |
| Schlößlesmühle | V |
| Cooking grinder | V |
| Burkhardtsmühle | V |
| Glassworks | V |
| Waldenbuch | IV |
Remarkably, the Musberg and Burkhardtsmühle stations had reception buildings , although they were only stops that also belonged to the lowest of a total of five station classes.
Vehicle use
The route was operated exclusively with steam locomotives . The 75 series was mainly used . All trains carried only the third class of car .
Current condition
The route itself has largely been preserved. In the local area of Leinfelden (between the street Neuer Markt and the Musberger Straße) and after a short break again in the local area of Musberg (between the Weilerwaldstraße on the outskirts of Leinfelden and the Filderstraße at the former Musberg stop) it serves as a graveled pedestrian path.
From the exit of Musberg to the entrance of Glashütte, the route is then paved throughout and is used intensively by hikers, cyclists, joggers and inline skaters, especially on weekends. The path on the former railway line is officially designated as a federal hiking trail by means of corresponding signs . It was established as early as 1960 as one of the first rail cycle routes in Germany. The unusual name of the federal hiking trail is therefore an indication of the history of this route. Despite being deedicated as a traffic route , the subgrade is still owned by the Federal Republic of Germany .
Only in the first few meters after the junction from the Filderbahn (built over with a business complex and parking lots) and in the final section including the Waldenbuch station area (completely built over with the Hakawerk industrial plants and an access road) are no traces of the route to be seen today.
In addition to the subgrade itself, numerous other remains of the earlier railway systems can be seen. In addition to all five bridge structures, there are also the station buildings Musberg (including a piece of the platform edge ), Steinenbronn (including a separate toilet facility) and Burkhardtsmühle. These three buildings are now all privately owned. The knee-high rectangular concrete foundations of the former wooden bus shelters have also been preserved at the Schlößlesmühle, Kochmühle and Glashütte stops . However, some of these have overgrown. In addition, at the Schlößlesmühle and Kochmühle stops you can also see the embankments of the former platforms. In addition, shortly after the viaduct at the Mäulesmühle and shortly before the Steinenbronn train station, two kilometer stones remained. However, they were rededicated and today mark kilometer 1 and kilometer 2 of the federal hiking trail.
In addition, the street name Am Bahnhof in Steinenbronn and Bahnhofstrasse in Waldenbuch remind us of the earlier rail connection between the two communities.
At the end of the Siebenmühlental, the route swings into the Aichtal. The state road L 1185 is crossed near the Burkhardtsmühle . The former bridge was completely rebuilt here as a pedestrian and cyclist bridge in 2011 and 2012. At this point, the old bridge had severely narrowed the road in a place that was already difficult to see.
literature
- Nikolaus Back: The Leinfelden – Waldenbuch railway line. In: Bernd Klagholz (Red.): The Siebenmühlental. Pictures and story (s). (= Filderstädter series of publications on history and regional studies, Volume 17.) Ed. Archives of the city of Leinfelden-Echterdingen and the city of Filderstadt. City archive, Leinfelden-Echterdingen and Filderstadt, 2003, ISBN 3-934760-05-8 .
- Peter-Michael Mihailescu, Matthias Michalke: Forgotten railways in Baden-Württemberg . Konrad Theiss Verlag, Stuttgart 1985, ISBN 3-8062-0413-6 , p. 183-186 .
Web links
- Description of the current state of the route on vergierter-bahnen.de
- Historical photos of the Siebenmühlentalbahn
- Picture of the course book page from 1944
- Description of today's cycle path , with illustrations
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b The "Landschaftsbahn" rolled for just 27 years , Filder-Zeitung, June 23, 2008, formerly replicated on sevenmuehlental.de ( Memento from August 10, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ without receipt