Trusebahn
| Wernshausen – Trusetal | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Route length: | 9.0 km | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gauge : | 750 mm ( narrow gauge ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Trusebahn was a narrow-gauge railway in Thuringia that was originally built and operated by Trusebahn AG (TB). It ran south of the Thuringian Forest from Wernshausen to Trusetal (until 1951: Herges-Auwallenburg).
history
Already in the summer of 1896 and 1897, a 600 mm field railway was running on the same route as the Trusebahn , which was built to support the municipality of Brotterode , which was almost completely burned down in 1895 .
On November 2, 1898, Trusebahn AG was founded by the Kingdom of Prussia, the district of Herrschaft Schmalkalden and the communities of Auwallenburg, Herges-Vogtei and Trusen. After a short construction period, the small railway was opened on July 25, 1899. Starting from the Wernshausen train station in the Werra valley, it led through the Trusetal on the western edge of the Thuringian Forest for 9 km with a maximum gradient of 1:30 upwards to Herges-Vogtei. The management was based in Herges-Vogtei, which was called Herges-Auwallenburg from 1936 and Trusetal from 1951.
In 1911, the limited partnership Lübbecke & Kehl, Eisenach , including the Trusebahn, planned to extend the Immelborn – Liebenstein-Schweina line to Brotterode and Waltershausen, but this failed. In 1938 the general meeting of the AG decided to convert it into an own operation of the district of Herrschaft Schmalkalden .
In April 1946, on the orders of the SMAD , the dismantling of the line as a reparation payment began, but ended shortly afterwards and the rails that had already been removed were rebuilt. On April 1, 1949, the circular railway was subordinated to the Deutsche Reichsbahn .
Passenger traffic ended with the winter timetable 1966/1967, freight traffic followed on December 31, 1968, after the removal of iron ore and barite had been shifted to road transport.
Vehicle use
Two two-axle steam locomotives ( WALLENBURG and MOMMEL ) were already in use as construction locomotives, but after the opening they proved to be too weak for regular trains, so that from 1901 the two machines were mostly parked cold as reserve machines. One locomotive was taken out of service in 1910, the other in 1922. In 1901 a third, this time four-axle machine, the HENNEBERG , was procured, which proved itself quite well and was in use until 1935.
In 1908 Trusebahn AG ordered a second four-axis machine, which was put into operation in 1909 as GLÜCKAUF . A second, identical locomotive, the TRUSETAL , was reordered in 1924. At the Deutsche Reichsbahn the locomotives were given the numbers 99 4531 and 99 4532. One of the locomotives made detours to Saxony after 1958 and was used as a shunting locomotive at Zittau station until 1990 . The other one served as a spare parts donor and was then scrapped.
From the beginning of the 1950s, the Deutsche Reichsbahn used brand-new locomotives of the 99.77–79 series in the Trusetal. These locomotives also came to Saxony after the line was closed.
References
literature
- Steffen Dietsch: The Trusebahn , EK-Verlag Freiburg 1996, ISBN 3-88255-421-5
- Anita Schöndube: Vom Trusebähnchen and other Thuringian smirk stories , ISBN 3-930588-32-3
