Stadthagen tram
The Stadthagen tram ran from September 4, 1897 to June 20, 1930 in the town of Stadthagen in Lower Saxony , which was then part of Schaumburg-Lippe . It was the last horse-drawn tram on the mainland in Germany , only the Spiekeroog island railway was operated with horses until 1949.
history
In 1897 the railway was founded by the haulier Christian Ruhe , who operated the railway until it was closed. The train ran from the station to the market and was 1.5 km long. The journey time was six minutes. The entire system was designed very sparingly, so the track laid out in meter gauge (1000 mm) had only a single switch as a branch to the depot . Evasion was not necessary.
After operations began with only one car, a second, slightly larger car with four windows was bought in 1909, and the smaller car was then only a reserve vehicle. From October 19, 1922 to February 23, 1924, the railway was closed due to the poor economic situation as a result of inflation .
In 1930 the railway was finally replaced by a bus line. The older car from 1897 was scrapped, the newer from 1909 was sold to the Spiekerooger Inselbahn and was in operation there until 1971. The rails were removed from the streets in 1933. Since then, the company Ruhe has operated city traffic in Stadthagen exclusively with buses.
literature
- Dieter Höltge: Trams and light rail vehicles in Germany, Volume 2: Lower Saxony / Bremen, EK-Verlag, Freiburg 1987, ISBN 3882553316