State railway
A state railway or state railway is a state owned by a state that builds and operates railways . Occasionally, railway companies are also referred to as state railways that are only under the administration of one state.
Definition
Original meaning
Originally - in places still to this day - the term state railway refers to railways owned by local authorities , which are referred to as the state . The state often had only partial ownership of a railway. It often happened with the Prussian railways that he took over a small part of the shares, but in return was able to run the business entirely on his own. In this case, it is not entirely clear how far the definition of a “state railway” applies.
Since the names of the various hierarchical levels of a political system are quite different both regionally and temporally, according to this definition, the catchment area and the period of existence of the so-called railway company must be known in order to derive the ownership and thus the meaning of the railway from the term to be able to.
The official designation in the plural with " Staatseisenbahnen ", which was widespread in German states before the First World War , indicates that the railways administered by the state could often be a large number of separate railway companies that did not form a single whole, either technically or administratively. This was the case with many of the state railways in Prussia .
The highest administrative level of state railways in countries of the German Empire (the former " Länderbahnen ") could often be assigned to a ministry, so in the Grand Duchy of Baden this was initially the Foreign Ministry, in the Kingdom of Prussia, however, the "Ministry of Trade, Industry and Public Works", later the "Ministry of Public Works" which was spun off from it. As a hierarchical intermediate level, the latter had independent “Royal Railway Directorates” of a railway, to which later regionally defined responsibilities were transferred.
Modern meaning
Around the middle of the 20th century a change in meaning towards a more unambiguous definition took place. According to this, the term state railways - corresponding to the term national railways, which is occasionally found in translations - explicitly denotes railways that are nationally owned, such as in the names " Canadian National Railway ", " Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane " and " Société nationale des chemins de fer français ”.
Railways owned by subordinate regional authorities in the German-speaking area are known as state railways ; in Germany, non-federally owned railways are predominantly used .
history
The state railways in Europe have a long tradition, but it was not until the 20th century that they were able to establish themselves across Europe in most countries. State railways were already being built in Belgium in 1835 .
The first state railway in Germany was the Duke Braunschweigische Staatseisenbahn , which opened on December 1, 1838 between Braunschweig and Wolfenbüttel . Most of the German states - such as Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Württemberg and Baden - also started building state railways early on. The largest German state, namely Prussia , initially built the Eastern Railway from 1851 onwards , but due to a lack of financial resources initially mainly relied on the construction of private railways. However, these were later largely bought up by the state and continued to operate as independent units. Most recently, the Prussian state railways were the largest in Europe .
In Austria, between 1884 and 1918, a large part of the railway lines were combined in the kk Austrian State Railways (kkStB).
In Switzerland, the state railway was only introduced in 1902, when many smaller private railways were combined in the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB). See also: Swiss National Railway
Since the end of the 20th century, the trend in Europe has been partially reversed: many state railways have been reprivatised , often due to pressure to liberalize the European Union and the opening of the rail transport markets. The Deutsche Bahn AG is operated according to a private sector, but is still a state railway, as the share capital is completely federally owned.
In the USA there is only one state railway besides Amtrak : the Alaska Railroad . The state of Canada is only the operator of VIA Rail Canada ; the former Canadian National Railway has now been privatized.
With 1.6 million employees is Indian State Railways Indian Railways the world's largest employers.
Selection of state railways
The following list contains railway companies that are fully owned by the respective state. The list does not claim to be complete.
Europe
North America
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South America
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Australia and Oceania
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Asia
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Africa
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