Trolleybus Freiburg – Farvagny

Freiburg – Farvagny
Car 1 in front of the old Freiburg train station
Route length:	12.5 km
Power system :	550 volts  =
Legend Freight depot 0.0 Freiburg 627  m above sea level M. Lausanne – Bern railway line Line 2 of the Freiburg trolleybus Pérolles ( demand stop ) 1.8 Daillettes 667  m above sea level M. Passage à level CFF (required stop) Lausanne – Bern railway line depot 3.0 La Glâne 616  m above sea level M. unrealized junction to Sainte-Apolline Glâne Froideville Moulin-Neuf (demand stop) 4.9 Hauterive 639  m above sea level M. 7.4 Posieux 681  m above sea level M. 9.8 Magnedens (Es Bous) 694  m above sea level M. 11.5 Farvagny-le-Petit 695  m above sea level M. 12.5 Farvagny-le-Grand 700  m above sea level M.

The trolleybus Freiburg – Farvagny was a trolleybus - overland route in the Swiss canton of Freiburg , in the German-speaking area at that time still called Gleislose Bahn . The 12.5 kilometer route was operated by the Compagnie des omnibus électriques Friborg – Farvagny and connected the old train station of Freiburg im Üechtland with Farvagny-le-Grand . It was the first trolleybus operation in Switzerland.

history

prehistory

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Freiburg-Daillettes Initiative Committee was founded with the aim of building a meter-gauge tram route from Freiburg to Les Daillettes, a district of Villars-sur-Glâne . If possible, this should be extended to Bulle .

In the meantime, however, they learned of the new acquisition of a trackless railway and in 1908 a delegation was sent to Austria for a visit . The first plant based on the Mercedes-Electrique-Stoll system was opened there in July 1907 with the Gmünd electrical overhead line automobile line. In Switzerland, however, only the demonstration drives with an electric vehicle at Chillon on December 17, 1900 have taken place.

In 1909 it was decided to forego the tram concession in favor of a trolleybus . Calculations had shown that only a third of the construction costs compared to a tram route could be expected. The route was to lead from Friborg via Daillettes to Farvagny, with a nearly one kilometer long branch in the hamlet of Sainte-Apolline, which also belongs to Villars-sur-Glâne, was planned before the Glâne bridge. In this way, a noodle factory was to be opened up for freight transport .

opening

On August 31, 1910, the committee received a license valid until September 1, 1915, which was finally extended to February 1, 1932 in 1912. The first section was the 7.4-kilometer route between the old Freiburg train station and Posieux . In addition to the Freiburg connecting line between the passenger station and the freight station, the route measured 7.73 kilometers. The test drives began on December 15, 1911, the opening ceremony took place on December 30, 1912, before regular operation began on January 4, 1912. The five-strong depot was in La Glâne, about 200 meters from the station of the same name. This in turn was located at the northern abutment of the bridge over the Glâne, where the converter station was also located . The last stop was in front of the Weisses Kreuz inn in Posieux. The fare for the thirty-minute journey was 60 cents.

On October 1, 1913, the 2.4-kilometer section Posieux– Magnedens (Es Bous) followed. However, this was temporarily shut down again between August 1914 and August 1915 because the road had to be adapted to the new loads first. The last section of the route was opened on November 1, 1916, the 2.7-kilometer section Magnedens (Es Bous) - Farvagny-le-Grand. From then on, an additional two-hour depot and another substation were available at the end point. This reached its maximum extent, but the planned branch to Sainte-Apolline was never built.

Decline

Due to the economic difficulties after the First World War , the extension to Bulle was no longer pursued. In addition, the vehicles had defects, which were mainly due to the not yet very advanced vehicle technology and the poor road conditions. The 1925 timetable contained five pairs of courses over the entire route and an additional pair of courses from Freiburg to La Glâne. After the electrification of the Lausanne – Bern railway line of the Swiss Federal Railways , the Romont – Bern section went into operation on May 15, 1927, the catenary at the level crossing in La Glâne had to be dismantled. From then on, the contact cart had to be laboriously repositioned on every trip; this task was taken over by an employee of the nearby depot. It was not until 1949 that this level crossing was replaced by a flyover a little further to the east, which would have made it possible to travel again without any obstacles.

The last valid timetable, a trip over the entire route cost two Swiss francs at the time. A separate reference was made to the delivery of mail for individual courses.

On April 1, 1929, management was transferred to the Chemins de fer électriques de la Gruyère (CEG). The CEG decided to use the concession until the end of its term on January 31, 1932, but not to extend it. The reasons for this lay on the one hand in the desire to extend the line beyond Farvagny and on the other hand in the slow and cumbersome operation when crossing and at the level crossing. On May 21, 1932, a trolleybus ran the route as scheduled for the last time, while 1.5 million people were transported electrically during the operating time.

From the following day, the CEG only used diesel buses , these ran continuously to Bulle. The regular travel time of 50 minutes by trolleybus was reduced to just 30 minutes after the changeover. Today the route is served by the regional bus route 336. In the city of Freiburg, the Freiburg Transport Authority has also been operating a modern trolleybus network with three lines since 1949 . West of the station, line 2 also serves a short section of the former route to Farvagny. The two garages in La Glâne and Farvagny as well as the transformer station in La Glâne have also been preserved, but the buildings are now used for other purposes.

Infrastructure

The overhead line from Freiburg to Farvagny was only single-lane on the whole route. It consisted of two copper wires with a distance of 30 centimeters and a cross-section of 65 square millimeters. These were located at a height of 5.8 meters above the roadway. The voltage was 550 volts direct current . The contact cart used in the Mercédès-Électrique-Stoll system ran on the wires; it was connected to the vehicle by a cable. The vehicles were thus able to travel in both directions without the installation of turning loops . When a car encountered, the contact carts were swapped between the vehicles by the driver unplugging his vehicle connector and plugging in the cart of the oncoming vehicle to continue driving. The Mercédès-Électrique-Stoll design allowed a lateral deviation of six to eight meters.

vehicles

Car 3 between Hauterive and Posieux, 1912

Three passenger cars with the company numbers 1 to 3 and a catenary truck were purchased. In addition to this overhead line truck, there were only two other such vehicles in Switzerland on the Gümmenen – Mühleberg “Gleislose Bahn” (trackless railway) operated from 1918 to 1922 - a pure goods trolleybus company.

All four vehicles were manufactured by Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft in Wiener Neustadt . The chassis and superstructures came from this manufacturer, and the electrical equipment was also installed here. All vehicles were delivered in 1911. The trolleybuses offered seventeen seats and seven standing places. They were initially 20 km / h fast, 3.2 tons in weight and had two wheel hub motors with 20 horsepower each . The wheels were made of wood, with a single rubber band on the front wheels and a double rubber band on the rear wheels. The two wheel hub motors were very susceptible, which is also due to the lack of suspension, and their sealing did not correspond to today's fully encapsulated motors. These construction weaknesses led to disruptions, because the roads at that time were still unsurfaced natural roads, with corresponding dust pollution for the engines. For this reason, the three vehicles had to be converted between 1917 and 1920. This happened at the Tribelhorn company in Feldbach , which also installed the new engines. After the conversion, the cars had a top speed of 25 km / h; the weight increased for cars 1 and 2 to 3.6 tons, for car 3 to 4.47 tons. The vehicles were kept in dark red color, in the area of ​​the undercarriage they were partially painted yellow.

So that the operation could be maintained was 1917 Saurer - gasoline type procured 32 R -Autobus. The trolley truck was rarely used due to the lack of a branch line. The vehicles were sold to private individuals after the discontinuation and have all been scrapped over time.

literature

• Sébastien Jacobi: Friborg en Tram. Self-published by Sébastien Jacobi, Neuchâtel 1985
• Jean-Philippe Coppex, Die Schweizer Überlandtrolleybusse , (bilingual: French and German), Verlag Endstation Ostring, Geneva 2008, ISBN 978-3-9522545-3-0
• Tramclub Freiburg (Ed.): A century of public transport in Freiburg , (bilingual: French and German), without publisher, Freiburg 1997, ISBN 2-9700147-0-X

Web links

• The first Swiss trolleybus line in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung on April 21, 2001
• Picture gallery on polier.ch

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} The first Swiss trolleybus line in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung on April 21, 2001
2. ^ Course book from 1932
3. ^ In front of the "White Cross" in Posieux, the trolleybus was the terminus at the time , Freiburger Nachrichten of August 14, 2012
4. ↑ 100 years of trolleybuses in Switzerland and Friborg , report on www.trolleymotion.ch from August 6, 2012  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.