Reutlingen tram

Reutlingen tram
Route length:	19.5 km
Gauge :	1000 mm ( meter gauge )
Power system :	750 volts  =
Maximum slope :	70  ‰
Top speed:	40 km / h
Legend Altenburg Oferdingen depot Oferdingen Bosch operations (formerly Gminder factory ) Rommelsbach North Rommelsbach middle Rommelsbach South Frankfurter Strasse (from 1969) State retirement home Hagen Esslinger Strasse Heilbronner Strasse Orschel Dietweg Dodge riding house (from 1968) Riding house Industrial track Slate road graveyard Betzingen Church Betzingen Quellenstrasse Betzingen Steinachstrasse Industrial track Bosch operations (formerly Gminder factory) Industrial track Villain sack Lohmühlestrasse Hohenzollernstrasse Karlsplatz (from 1968) Plochingen – Tübingen railway line Central Station (formerly Reutlingen State Station ) Central Station (1927–1955) Karlsplatz (temporarily a place of the SA ) Karlsplatz (from 1968) Marketplace Marienkirche Burgplatz (formerly Albstraße) Seestrasse Uhlandstrasse Erwin-Seiz-Strasse Arbach switch Südbahnhof (formerly Rank) Trolley pit Reutlingen – Schelklingen railway line Eningen Kadel ( required stop ) Eningen Spitzwiesen Mechanical cotton weaving mill in Eningen under Achalm Eningen weaving mill Eningen (formerly Eningen Ort) Pfullingen Arbach Bridge Pfullingen Goethestrasse (from 1968) Pfullingen Art Mill (until 1968) JJ Schlayer, leather and leather goods factory Pfullingen Bismarckstraße (formerly Pfullingen Traube) Pfullingen Lindenplatz ( pass until 1968) Pfullingen Laiblinsplatz

The Reutlingen tram was an electrically operated tram system with a gauge of 1000 millimeters , which emerged in 1912 from the steam-powered local Reutlingen – Eningen railway and connected the city of Reutlingen with its suburbs until 1974 . All routes were single-tracked and provided with diversions , in large parts the network had the character of an overland tram . The means of transport, popularly known as the “Funken Chaise ”, used a direct voltage of 750 volts; the maximum permissible speed was 40 km / h. In addition to passenger traffic, there was also freight traffic until 1962 . As part of the planning for a Neckar-Alb regional light rail , Reutlingen is to get a light rail based on the Karlsruhe model .

history

The Reutlingen – Eningen local railway (1899)

A local train in Eningen Ort station

→ Main article : Local railway Reutlingen – Eningen

During the construction of the Echaz Valley Railway from Reutlingen via Honau to Kleinengstingen , which went into operation in 1892 , the off-track community of Eningen under Achalm could not be taken into account. Although the later Reutlinger Südbahnhof was initially called “Eningen u. A. “, but it was two and a half kilometers from the town center and was therefore unable to satisfy the traffic needs of the people of Eningen. At the initiative of the municipality, the Innsbruck railway entrepreneur Hermann Ritter von Schwind built a local train between Reutlingen state train station and Eningen Ort, operated as a steam tram in the city of Reutlingen . On November 1, 1899, the 4.79-kilometer line was put into operation. While a separate route was built between Eningen and the outskirts of Reutlingen, the tracks within Reutlingen were in the street space and led through Albstraße and Gartenstraße to today's main station .

Despite good demand, the railway made losses almost from the start. For this reason, Schwind ceded the railway to the municipality of Eningen in 1903. But even under municipal management, the losses remained high. From 1906 there were considerations for an electric tram. In 1909 negotiations began between the local railway administration and the Württembergische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (WEG) with the aim of selling the route as the basis for the planned tram. However, quarrels with Pfullingen initially prevented further plans, and the sale could not be completed until 1911.

Electrification and expansion to Betzingen (1912)

July 24, 1912: two decorated opening trains wait in front of the main train station for the guests of honor from Stuttgart

The Württembergische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft began on March 15, 1912 with the expansion of the Reutlingen – Eningen local railway, while the entire line was provided with an overhead line . It extended the route from the city center through Gutenbergstrasse and Hohenzollernstrasse, today's Tübinger Strasse, to the western district of Betzingen . The end of the line, named after the Mauritius Church, was located there at the western end of Steinachstrasse. In the vernacular, however, the terminus was called Schwane , among other things because monthly tickets for the tram were also sold in the inn that gave its name to Zum Schwan . Betzingen, which at that time was still very village-like, was not incorporated into Reutlingen until 1907, but had already had a rail connection with Reutlingen through the extension of the railway line coming from Plochingen to Tübingen and Rottenburg am Neckar in 1861 . The Reutlingen Westbahnhof, located on this route, also received an additional tram connection in 1912 with the Hohenzollernstraße stop.

On July 24, 1912, the 7.23 kilometer long diameter electric tram line from Eningen via Reutlingen to Betzingen was inaugurated. Initially, 22 pairs of trains ran , and the new line carried 90,000 people in the first year. In the old town of Reutlingen, the Eninger line was completely re-routed to Burgplatz in 1912. It was relocated from Gartenstrasse, which is more remote from the city center, three cross streets further west into Wilhelmstrasse, at that time the main traffic artery in Reutlingen, and from then on also served the central market square. The residents of Gartenstrasse, which was fashionable at the time, had previously spoken out in favor of relocation because they had had enough of the smoke and noise of the steam tram. In return, the dealers expressly approved the relocation along the new route. Together with the rails, the previously graveled Wilhelmstrasse was also the first Reutlinger Strasse to be paved .

Reutlingen Central Station remained connected to the Eningen line by a short branch line even after 1912 . It led from the central junction consisting of Karlstrasse, Wilhelmstrasse, Lederstrasse (today Eberhardstrasse) and Unter den Linden via Unter den Linden and Bahnhofstrasse to Listplatz. There it met again on the old local railway line, which means that its departure point at the confluence of Kaiserstraße and Bahnhofstraße was retained for certain trains to and from Eningen. The intersection Karlstraße / Wilhelmstraße / Lederstraße / Unter den Linden was always called Karlsplatz in the context of the tram, although this was never an official street name for the city of Reutlingen. During the National Socialist era , the most important tram stop was temporarily called Platz der SA . Even after 1912, Eningen remained the operational focus of the railway, where the former locomotive shed of the local railway became a fully-fledged depot for the electric trams .

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  First route of the electric tram in the city center on a city map from 1913. Coming from Eningen, the trains could either go to Betzingen or to the main station.

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  A three-car train from Eningen at the beginning of the new route on Burgplatz, the local railway branched off here into Gartenstrasse, the disconnected track is still there

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  Passage at the Reutlingen Südbahnhof, behind the railcar the junction to the trolley pit

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  A car from Eningen reaches the terminal church in Betzingen

Extension to Pfullingen (1916)

Car 26 in the opening year 1916 at the terminal at Traube in Pfullingen, characteristic of this line were the red destination signs

The Pfullingen municipal council had blocked original plans to build a branch line from the Eningen tram to Pfullingen. The place had also had a train station on the Echaz Valley Railway since 1892, but it was significantly cheaper than the neighboring Eningen state train station. On the other hand, the citizens and manufacturers of Pfullingen were dissatisfied; they felt they had been marginalized and therefore demanded the tram connection from their local council. Only the Reutlingen leather and shoe manufacturer Wilhelm Silber caused a rethink in the local council. He made the construction of an additional factory in Pfullingen dependent on the construction of the tram there, because the planned company site was too far away from the Pfullingen train station.

On July 23, 1913, the municipality of Pfullingen signed a contract with the WEG for a new line from Reutlinger Südbahnhof to Pfullingen Laiblinsplatz, and on December 20, 1913 the state granted the concession. Due to the war , however, construction could not begin until June 1916. The new connection finally went into operation on September 29, 1916 as a radial line from Reutlingen to Pfullingen and, always following Marktstrasse, initially only led to what was then Gasthaus Traube. In Reutlingen, the new Pfullinger line took over the operation of the main station at the same time, although individual trains of the Eninger line continued to go there. To better distinguish it from the cars on the existing line, whose destinations were indicated in positive black letters on a white background, the Pfullinger Line had red destination signs with negative white letters .

Received with the extension to Pfullingen, analogous to the mechanical cotton weaving eningen , finally, the JJ Schlayer, leather and leather goods factory as planned their own siding . It branched off to the right from the main route between the confluence of Kunstmühlestraße and the confluence of Zeilstraße and crossed Liststraße, Heergassenbach and Uhlandstraße. This enabled the company to be supplied directly with raw cattle hides, which were then processed into leather .

It was not until May 21, 1926, that the tram in Pfullingen was able to travel to Lindenplatz before reaching its final destination on October 20, 1927 at Laiblinsplatz and thus a total length of 4.20 kilometers. Also in 1927, the Pfullinger line at the main train station received the first turning loop of the Reutlingen tram. This was a counterclockwise block loop Karlsplatz – Karlstraße – Listplatz – Bahnhofstraße – Unter den Linden – Karlsplatz, the end point was on Listplatz. The block bypass served only to the smoother operation, directional vehicles never existed in Reutlingen. In return, the former terminus of the local railway at the confluence of Kaiserstrasse and Bahnhofstrasse was omitted in 1927.

Extension to Rommelsbach, Oferdingen and Altenburg (1928)

Even before the First World War, the city of Reutlingen was discussing plans to further develop the northern area, the so-called northern area of the city. Above all, it was about the connection with the neighboring towns of Rommelsbach , Oferdingen and Altenburg am Neckar . The above-mentioned communities were administratively part of the Tübingen Regional Office , but they were more closely connected to Reutlingen. The main aim was to strategically bind them to the city even more closely.

In particular, from the point of view of that time, the industry could only continue to be supplied with workers from this area. This was especially true for the spinning tube and bobbin factory Emil Adolff GmbH & Co., at that time the largest employer in the city. But if the employees should arrive at work well rested, they sometimes had to walk long walks before the start of the shift. In addition, after nine hours of factory work, many of them still had to take care of the agriculture. In return, the plans that emerged in 1905 for a so-called left-bank Neckar Railway between Nürtingen and Kirchentellinsfurt collided with Reutlingen's interests. This route would have directed traffic from the north towards Tübingen.

That is why there were plans for a tram from Reutlingen to Altenburg before 1914, but the war initially thwarted this project. In the difficult post-war period, the outlook was no better. Nevertheless, in 1919 an expert opinion for an electric tram was drawn up and an application for a license was also prepared. At that time it was planned to build a branch line in addition to the main line to Altenburg, which would lead from "below the Dietweg" via Degerschlacht to Sickenhausen , both of which were still independent communities at the time. The license was unsuccessful due to the chaos after the war. As a result of the reorganization of the German Empire and the transition from the Royal Württemberg State Railways to the Deutsche Reichsbahn in 1920, the parties could not agree.

The Altenburg line's timetable from 1931, not all trains served the entire route

After further delays due to the strong inflation of that time, the Reutlingen municipal council finally decided on July 9, 1926 to build the line to Altenburg, but without a branch to Sickenhausen. The problem became more and more acute, in March 1927 there were 445 workers on Dietweg alone who walked to Reutlingen between 5:30 and 7:30 a.m. The city took over the construction costs of 1,120,000 marks including the purchase of land and the renovation of the municipal roads in full, but according to another source, the municipalities involved had to take care of the land purchase themselves. In addition, six Reutlingen-based companies agreed by contract to raise 17,000 marks each for a possible operating deficit for ten years.

The city had previously signed a contract with WEG on September 24, 1924, which initially took over administration and operation of the new Altenburg line. After the building permit from September 2, 1927, construction work could begin in spring 1928. Because there were enough workers at the time, construction progressed quickly, and the facility ultimately cost 728,813.66 marks. On August 1, 1928, the 8.26-kilometer connection - 85 percent of it on its own track - was finally opened. The final section down into the Neckar valley was henceforth also the steepest section of the Reutlingen tram, the maximum gradient there was seven percent. A second depot was built on the property at Im Besterwasen 14 on the outskirts of Oferdingen in the direction of Altenburg for the four motor coaches and five trailer cars that were newly acquired at the time . Initially, the tram to Altenburg actually mainly served rush-hour traffic, but increasingly brought the desired closer connection with the city.

In principle, the new line was successful, as early as January 1929 a motor car and a trailer had to be purchased in order to cope with rush hour traffic. Although the line was only rarely able to make a profit because of the interest and repayment burdens, Reutlingen's political bill worked and the communities connected to the tram came to the Reutlingen district in 1938 . In addition, the new Altenburg route in turn meant that the Gminder company set up a fourth weaving mill on the open field between Rommelsbach and Oferdingen in 1927. There were two stops called Gmindersche Fabrik , one on the Betzinger and one on the Altenburg route.

Municipalization of the Altenburg route (1930)

However, the first settlement of the WEG for the Altenburg route caused inconsistencies with the city, so that the city decided to take over the operation there as early as March 1, 1930 under the name Städtische Strassenbahn Reutlingen-Altenburg . The Reutlingen electricity company was responsible for operational management. There were thus two economically independent tram operators in Reutlingen. The urban line, however, worked at a loss. The city therefore decided to take over the routes to Eningen and Pfullingen that had remained with the WEG in order to own a single, more profitable company. However, due to the protection against dismissal of 30 years agreed with the WEG in 1912 , this step could only be taken years later.

Localization of the entire network (1944)

After the complete municipalization, a network picture ticket for a section of 20 pfennigs was issued

In the middle of the Second World War , as planned in the early 1930s, after lengthy negotiations, the remaining WEG routes to Betzingen, Eningen and Pfullingen were finally passed into the ownership of the city. The official handover took place on March 1, 1944. At the WEG, the Reutlingen branch was always a foreign body anyway, because the company otherwise had no other tram company. From then on, all of the 18.3 kilometers of the route were then owned by the municipal company , henceforth known as the Reutlingen trams , which in turn became part of the Reutlingen municipal utilities in 1952 . With the completion of municipalization, the city of Reutlingen also introduced line numbers. These were initially only given in the timetables and on the route time cards, but not on the vehicles themselves. The three numbers were assigned as follows in the order in which they were opened:

Line 1:	Eningen – Karlsplatz – Südbahnhof – Betzingen
Line 2:	Hauptbahnhof – Karlsplatz – Südbahnhof – Pfullingen
Line 3:	Karlsplatz – Altenburg

For the first time in its history, the tram was now making a profit. However, the previous separation had an effect for years to come. For example, during the Second World War, but before it was handed over to the city, WEG equipped its part of the business with semi-automatic BSI compact couplings , while the Altenburg route had to make do with the old manually operated pin couplings until 1962 .

Post-war period and cessation of freight traffic

The war caused overhead lines destroyed by bombing in the inner city in the area of ​​the street Unter den Linden and on the Betzinger route . The vehicles, on the other hand, remained largely undamaged thanks to the depots located far outside. After the relatively minor war damage had been repaired, the Altenburg line was able to go back into operation in May 1945 after a brief shutdown. From October 1945, the tram again served the entire network. In the post-war period, it performed at its best, and in 1945 it had already carried five million passengers. in the years 1946 to 1948 it was then already nine million, another source gives as much as 9.9 million for 1948.

Due to the new construction of the Römerschanze and Storlach settlements, the number of passengers on the Altenburger line continued to rise in the post-war period. Because the route to the northern part of the city was still continuously single-track, the timetable could not be consolidated, so alternatively booster cars operated as follow- up trains to the cemetery or the Reithaus. The train ahead was marked with a special sign as a priority .

On April 1, 1952, the private company Hogenmüller & Kull opened the first city ​​bus route in Reutlingen, whereupon two urban modes of transport existed in parallel for the next 22 years. In contrast to the tram, the street competition was profitable from the start.

In 1955, after 56 years, the main station lost its direct tram connection when the turning loop there was closed. From then on, the trains on line 2 ended bluntly at the confluence of Gartenstrasse with Karlstrasse.

From 1960/1961, Reutlingen - the penultimate tram operator in West Germany - gave the respective line names on the vehicles themselves. At this point in time only the two lines of the Esslingen – Nellingen – Denkendorf tram had no official line names.

In 1957, the municipality of Eningen moved its public loading point from the train station to the siding to the weaving mill. In 1962, freight traffic finally ended, and with it the roll-stand operation once taken over by the local railway .

Expansion to Orschel-Hagen and largest expansion (1964)

Line network at the time of greatest expansion between September 12, 1964 and September 5, 1967

The route network was expanded for the last time in the spring of 1964 with the almost one kilometer branch line from the Altenburg route to the garden city of Orschel-Hagen , which was built between 1960 and 1970 . In view of the high density of buildings there, the connection to the tram seemed more appropriate than the establishment of a new bus line. The connection comprised three new stops and went into operation on September 12, 1964; the terminal was on Leutkircher Weg, not far from the center of the settlement. There the tram had a counter-clockwise turning loop available. When nominating their stations Stadtwerke directed to the original field names there, so the branch station was on the drum Straße Orschel and the final stop Hagen .

In 1964, with a route length of 19.5 kilometers, the network was the largest in its history. Of this, 12.8 kilometers were on its own track. In total, the track length including all switches and sidings in the depots was 22.2 kilometers. In 1952 there were a total of 64 points .

The new line to Orschel-Hagen was served by the new line 4, which, like line 3, began at Karlsplatz and was 3.60 kilometers long. It was the only line that left the Reutlingen city area at no point. Although the tram did not go directly through the satellite town of Orschel-Hagen, but only served its southern periphery, this route was considered the most economical of the entire network.

Rising deficit and insufficient development of the city

As a result of socially acceptable fares and high personnel costs, the annual trams' balance sheets showed steadily increasing deficits as early as 1949. Thanks to the profits from the electricity business , the other part of the Reutlingen public utility company, these did not pose a problem economically. In the 1950s, the proponents of a switch to bus operation - which was already being considered at the time - therefore had no chance, because the then Mayor Oskar Kalbfell stopped the railway is irreplaceable. Nevertheless, the annual deficit served the advocates of motorized individual transport in the municipal council as a welcome means of pressure to permanently prevent future-oriented investments in a systematic renewal of the vehicle fleet and the double-track expansion of the main routes.

In addition, the tram was only geared towards north-south traffic, while the city developed in an east-west direction during its construction activities after the war. With the exception of Orschel-Hagen, the development of these new residential areas with new rail lines was out of the question because of the high costs. The only option left was to connect these areas to the tram network by means of an omnibus shuttle service. This particularly affected the large Sondelfingen district , as well as Betzenried, the Burgholzsiedlung, the Im Efeu settlement, the Voller Brunnen settlement, Degerschlacht, Sickenhausen, the Wildermuthsiedlung, Ohmenhausen , Ringelbach and the Markwasen.

Lambert report (1966)

Due to the growing deficit, the city of Reutlingen gave the Stuttgart traffic scientist Professor Dr. Walther Lambert commissioned an expert opinion on the future of the tram. Lambert was seen as a representative of the separation of public and private transport, especially in city centers. The street was supposed to belong to private traffic - according to the then current concept of the car-friendly city - but public traffic to disappear into the underground.

In his local traffic report, Lambert recommended converting the tram network, either in whole or in part, to bus operation. On the other hand, he expressly distanced himself from continuing to operate in the form at that time. In principle, however, he also rejected the parallel operation of trams and buses as uneconomical, especially with reference to the size of the city. As an alternative, the traffic scientist preferred a complete changeover to omnibus traffic with a bus tunnel under the central Karlsplatz junction, the tram should give way gradually.

First of all, the power supply units with low traffic volume should have their turn during the conversion. These included, in particular, the Karlsplatz – Betzingen sections of line 1, where a traffic count at the peak hour only saw 285 passengers, and Rommelsbach – Altenburg of line 3. In contrast, the Reithaus– section served jointly by lines 3 and 4 had Schieferstraße up to 1325 passengers every hour. The traffic expert also noticed that the cars were particularly full in the mornings and evenings, but were largely empty in between. This resulted in uneconomical vehicle use for him. Furthermore, the network did not have any significant transfer or through traffic and could not react inexpensively and flexibly to the increasing volume of traffic in the “insufficiently developed” peripheral areas of the growing city.

Regardless of the Lambert report, the Betzingen route was given a new route in the year before it was closed in the city center. In connection with the construction of the north ring road bypass , the trains on line 1 no longer crossed the railroad tracks from April 2, 1966 on Gutenbergstrasse, but together with lines 3 and 4 on Unter den Linden. For this purpose, an approximately 250-meter-long new line was built through Gutenbergstrasse and Gminderstrasse, past the French cinema .

Closure of the Betzingen line (1967)

The changeover to omnibus traffic became concrete at the beginning of 1967 after a personnel change in the finance department of the mayor's office, when Karl Guhl received the post of First Mayor under Oskar Kalbfell . For Guhl, the deficit was no longer acceptable, which is why he had the section to Betzingen operated, initially on a trial basis, from September 6, 1967, due to road construction work in Gutenbergstrasse as a replacement rail service. Originally this was only supposed to last about three months, but on October 3, 1967, the local council decided to shut down the Betzingen line for good.

Only three years after the new line to Hagen went into operation, the Reutlingen tram began to decline, and line 1 also ended as a radial line at Karlsplatz. Sometimes Line 1 only shuttled between Eningen and the Südbahnhof, where passengers had to change to and from Line 2. On October 1, 1968, the Betzingen route took over a regular cross-city bus line from Hogenmüller & Kull instead of the replacement rail service . It led from Betzingen to the Efeu settlement.

Failed line network reform (1968)

The sections of the route that remained after the Betzinger branch was abandoned were reconnected from January 6, 1968. The offer was even condensed, despite the planned overall setting. Thus, a main route was created between Karlsplatz and Orschel, and all four lines were used, and two lines each now ran to Hagen and Rommelsbach:

Line 1:	Eningen - Karlsplatz - Orschel - Hagen
Line 2:	Pfullingen - Karlsplatz - Orschel - Rommelsbach center
Line 3:	Karlsplatz - Orschel - Rommelsbach Mitte - Altenburg
Line 4:	Karlsplatz - Orschel - Hagen

In the run-up to the timetable change in January 1968, it was also necessary to adapt the crossing options . This is how the new Reithaus siding was built on the open road, and the Kunstmühle stop in Pfullingen was replaced by the new Goethestraße stop, located a little further north, with a meeting point. In this context, the Pfullinger route itself was also redrawn. From then on, it ran on the eastern instead of the western side of Marktstrasse, which was now also paved instead of just paved. As a further modernization measure, a house block loop went into operation in the center of Pfullingen in 1968. From the Laiblinsplatz terminus, the trolleys on line 2 continued to drive along Badstrasse and Große Heerstrasse to finally reach the existing line again at Lindenplatz.

However, due to bad planning at Karlsplatz, additional shunting efforts were necessary for the trains ending there , which after the introduction of the new line network led to chaos and hours of delays. The previous line network was therefore reintroduced after just a few days.

Network division (1968)

Ultimately, the beginning of the renovation of Karlsplatz, including new pedestrian underpasses, sealed the end of the tram. In order to get the central junction tram-free, lines 3 and 4 were given a provisional transfer terminal on Gutenbergstrasse from July 18, 1968 , while lines 1 and 2 had their provisional terminus from April 14, 1969 at the northern end of Wilhelmstrasse. The Reutlingen tram was again divided into a north and a south network. There was no track connection, the cars on lines 1 and 2 were provided by the Eningen depot, while the Oferdingen depot was responsible for lines 3 and 4. This separation was initially only planned temporarily. However, on March 19, 1969, the local council decided not to install the new tracks planned on Karlsplatz, but instead to completely stop tram traffic as soon as possible. The basis for this was a second report by the traffic expert and ADAC official Prof. Dr.-Ing. Karlheinz Schaechterle from the Technical University of Munich , which he also published in 1969.

Shutdown (1974)

In terms of its capital resources, however, the private company Hogenmüller & Kull was not yet in a position to take over the additional traffic resulting from the intended general suspension of the tram in the spring of 1969. Because its bus operation had proven itself, however, the city of Reutlingen and Hogenmüller & Kull founded a mixed- economy company on October 1, 1969, called RSV Reutlinger Stadtverkehrsgesellschaft mbH Hogenmüller & Kull Co. KG , or RSV for short.

The northern network with the routes to Altenburg and Hagen was used for the last time on May 30, 1970, so that the new route to Hagen was ultimately not even in operation for a full six years. The decommissioning of the two South Range to Eningen and Pfullingen was originally scheduled for 1972, but an objection of delayed regional council because of insufficient road conditions at South Station first implementation. The last time the tram ran, with great sympathy from the population, was on Saturday, October 19, 1974. The very last train reached Eningen at 11:20 pm.

The former tram routes were operated by the RSV buses, and the four line numbers were also transferred to them.

vehicles

Overview

In total, the Reutlingen tram used 28 railcars and 44 sidecars during its existence. There were also various work cars , roller stands and a two-axle freight locomotive with a central driver's cab. While the steam locomotives of the local railway were decommissioned and sold on the occasion of the electrification, the ten passenger cars and the baggage cars were converted for electrical operation. The electric railcars pulled up to three two-axle sidecars, these four-car trains were a special feature of the Reutlingen tram.

Almost all of the cars procured for the electric tram were supplied by the Esslingen machine factory, and in many cases Reutlingen used the Stuttgart tram fleet as a reference when ordering . Various used vehicles were also taken over, mainly from Stuttgart. After the tram was discontinued, only the three newest articulated vehicles of the GT4 type could be sold to Stuttgart, the remaining vehicles were mostly scrapped. Some vehicles went to tram museums, a train consisting of a motor car and two sidecars remained in Reutlingen as a memorial.

List of railcars and locomotives

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  Car 21 in the Hanover Tram Museum

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  Car 26 in the Recklinghausen substation

designation	Construction year	Manufacturer	Seats	Wheel alignment	Retirement	Remarks
21-27	1912-1916	Herbrand wagon factory	18th	2x	from 1968	Tw 21 1971 at the German Tram Museum, today exhibited in the Hanover Tram Museum . Tw 27 exhibited as a memorial at the Reutlingen municipal utility.
28-29	1928	Machine factory in Esslingen	18th	2x	from 1970	Tw 29 acquired and currently being restored by the Pfullingen customs association
30-31	1912	Machine factory in Esslingen	18th	2x	from 1974	Originally built for the Esslingen tram , in 1949 ex Stuttgart trams, Tw 30 today again as Esslinger Tw 7 in the Stuttgart tram world , while Tw 31 was converted into the historic sidecar 17 for the Zwickau tram .
32-33	1908	Swiss wagon factory Schlieren	16	2x	from 1964	1951 ex Tram Luzern , only used as a work car
34	1910	Machine factory in Esslingen	16	2x	1974	1961 ex Stuttgart trams 340, today again as the Stuttgart Tw 340 in the Stuttgart tram world
35	1929	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974	1962 ex Stuttgart trams 259, today as SSF Tw 15 in the Stuttgart tram world
51-54	1928	Machine factory in Esslingen	18th	2x	from 1970	No. 53 1974 to the Bergische Museumsbahnen , 2006 back to Reutlingen in private ownership
55	1929	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974
56-58	1955-1957	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974
59-61	1964	Machine factory in Esslingen	41	4x	1974	1976 sold to the Stuttgart trams, from there to the tram in Ulm , conversion to a one-way car, parked and scrapped in 1988
62-63	1950	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974	1966 ex Stuttgart trams
Freight locomotive 1	1913	BBC Mannheim		2x	1963

List of sidecars

designation	Construction year	Manufacturer	Seats	Wheel alignment	Retirement	Remarks
1-10	1899	Rastatt wagon factory	12	2x	from 1938	Bw 2 exhibited as a memorial at the Reutlingen municipal utility.
11-13	1916	Herbrand wagon factory	18th	2x	from 1963
14th	1914	AG for railway supplies, Weimar	18th	2x	1963	1921 ex tram Hohenstein-Ernstthal-Oelsnitz
15-16	1914	Saxon wagon factory in Werdau	22nd	2x	from 1950	1925 ex Krefeld tram
17-19, first line-up	1900	Wroclaw Company for Railway Car Construction	?	4x	before 1938	1925 ex Electric Kleinbahn Mansfeld
17-18	1936	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1970
19-20	1939	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	from 1970	Bw 20 1974 to the Bergische Museumsbahnen, 2008 back to Reutlingen in private ownership
36-39	1950	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	from 1970
40-42	1953	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974	Bw 40 was acquired by the Pfullingen customs association and is to be restored. Bw 41 has been used as the historic Bw 1241 in Stuttgart since 1974, Bw 42 has been refurbished as SSF 22 and stored in the Stuttgart Tram World.
43-47	1955-1957	Fox wagon factory	22nd	2x	1974
48-49	1964	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974
51	1899	Rastatt wagon factory	no	2x		Luggage car of the local train
71-76	1928-1929	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	from 1968	Bw 76 exhibited as a memorial at the Reutlingen municipal utilities.
77-78	1964	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x	1974	1962 ex Stuttgart trams, Bw 77 has been back in Stuttgart since 1994, where it is to be refurbished as Bw 1255.
79-82	1950-1953	Machine factory in Esslingen	22nd	2x		1968 ex Stuttgart trams, no longer in service

Relics

The most striking relic of the Reutlingen tram is the Eninger reception building at Bahnhofstrasse 18 , which has been preserved to this day, including the attached goods shed with loading ramp . The ensemble dates back to the time of the local railway and its construction corresponds to a typical Württemberg train station. The track apron itself was built over with a residential and commercial building in the area of ​​the station entrance. The area at the level of the reception building serves as a parking lot. The neighboring tram depot was only demolished in 2002, and its site is now used as a football field . The outer wall was preserved and delimits the football field from the slope. In addition, the Eningen street names Bahnhofstraße and Auf dem Bahndamm are still reminiscent of the former rail connection of the place.

In Eningen on the site of the weaving mill and in Pfullingen on the bridge over the Heergassenbach are the last two remains of the tram track. Between the bridge mentioned and the former intersection with Uhlandstrasse there is also a complete overhead line mast including a boom; individual mast foundations have been preserved on the Eningen route. There are also some overhead line rosettes in Wilhelmstrasse and Albstrasse .

In addition, a total of five sections of the Reutlingen tram, which are routed independently of the road network, are now used as footpaths and cycle paths:

• 2.1 kilometers between Südbahnhof and Eningen Weberei (line 1), asphalted
• 1.9 kilometers between Dietweg and Rommelsbach Süd (line 3), asphalted
• 1.6 kilometers between Rommelsbach Nord and Oferdingen (Line 3), paved
• 0.9 kilometers between Orschel and Hagen (Line 4), paved
• 0.7 kilometers between the connecting road from Oferdingen to Altenburg and the terminal Altenburg (line 3), gravelled

literature

• Wolf Rüdiger Gassmann, Claude Jeanmaire: Reutlinger Strassenbahn. Verlag Eisenbahn, Villigen 1977, ISBN 3-85649-034-5 .
• Bernhard Madel: The local railway Reutlingen - Eningen. In: Lok Magazin issue 161 pp. 124-131, Stuttgart 1990.
• Bernhard Madel: The railcar 29 of the Reutlingen tram. In: Tram magazine issue 86, pp. 321-330, Stuttgart 1992.
• Bernhard Madel: From the history of the Reutlingen tram: The work cars 32 and 33 from Lucerne. In: Tram-Bulletin Issue 14 pp. 24–51, Tramclub Basel, Basel 1993.
• Bernhard Madel: Out and about in Reutlingen - even under difficult conditions, aspects from the history of the tram in Reutlingen 1930–1950. In: Reutlinger Geschichtsblätter NF No. 34 pp. 247-307, Reutlingen 1995.
• Bernhard Madel: "Smoke, steam, hissing and blowing" - the local train drove through Gartenstrasse for twelve years. In: Reutlinger Geschichtsblätter NF No. 36, pp. 175-180, Reutlingen 1997.
• Bernhard Madel: Under the Achalm: The Post on the way by horse and local train. In: Post and Telecommunications History, Southwest Regional Area. Issue 1-1997, pp. 41-54, Bühl 1997.
• Bernhard Madel: Mail delivery by tram in the Reutlingen area. In: Post and Telecommunications History, Southwest Regional Area. Issue 1999, pp. 57-77, Bühl 1999.
• Bernhard Madel: A man sees red (e numbers), From the shutdown of a tram. In: Stadt-Bahn-Bus, Stuttgart local transport yesterday this morning. Issue 3/2004, Stuttgart 2004.
• Peter-Michael Mihailescu, Matthias Michalke: Forgotten railways in Baden-Württemberg . Konrad Theiss Verlag, Stuttgart 1985, ISBN 3-8062-0413-6 , p. 208-210 .
• tram-TV: Long-forgotten trams: Esslingen-Nellingen-Denkendorf & Reutlingen, DVD, publisher: tram-TV Cologne, ISBN 978-3-9813669-6-9
• Andreas Ernst, Hans-Christian Ernst, Rainer Pachutzki: This is how the Reutlingen tram was - in the film, in photos, in memories. , Verlag Oertel + Spoehrer, Reutlingen 2014, ISBN 978-3 88627-361-4 .
• Bernhard Madel: Last trip 40 years ago. In: Tram magazine issue 302 , pp. 62–69, Munich 2014, ISSN  0340-7071 10815

Web links

• Information and pictures

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l} Buses defeated the tram - Reutlingen's last "Funken-Chaise" drove 20 years ago: memories of a piece of city history , article by Stephan Zenke in Reutlinger General-Anzeiger from October 17, 1994
2. ↑ The local railway Reutlingen - Eningen u. A. on www.vergessene-bahnen.de
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Wolfgang Bauer: Schwind-Start in Eningen , online at neckar-chronik.de, accessed on November 1, 2018
4. ↑ ^{a b c d} Bernhard Madel: Electric through Wilhelmstrasse , article in Südwest Presse , online at swp.de, accessed on November 23, 2018
5. ↑ ^{a b c d e In} 1928 the tram line to Altenburg was opened , article by Bernhard Mädel in the Südwest Presse on August 11, 2003, online at neckar-chronik.de, accessed on November 30, 2018
6. ↑ ^{a b c d e} 90 years ago: How it came to line 3 , article from August 14, 2009 on rommelsbach.blogspot.com, accessed on December 1, 2018
7. ↑ Gminder AG resided in Tübinger Straße until 1964 , article by Holger Lange in the Schwäbisches Tagblatt of March 31, 2011, online at tagblatt.de, accessed on November 30, 2018
8. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} History of Reutlinger Stadtverkehr on rsv.de, accessed on November 22, 2018
9. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} A wreath for the tram 1974 - the last trip of the tram went to the Eninger Depot , article by Bernhard Madel in the Schwäbisches Tagblatt from October 16, 2004, online at tagblatt.de, accessed on November 21, 2018
10. ↑ ^{a b} Betzingen without a tram line? The municipal council decides on Tuesday - the deficit will not decrease , article in the Reutlinger General-Anzeiger from September 28, 1967
11. ↑ Herbert Stemmler: The simplest solution - Reutlingen's tram and its end . In: Straßenbahn Magazin, issue 127, May 2000, pp. 62–66.