Weissenstein tunnel
The Weissenstein Tunnel is a 3701 m long, single-lane railway tunnel on the Solothurn – Moutier railway line , which was built by the former Solothurn-Münster Railway . It crosses under the 1395 m high Weissenstein as a Jura cut .
Location and construction
The north portal is at Gänsbrunnen at 722 meters above sea level and its south portal at 659 meters above sea level near Oberdorf .
The tunnel has a one-sided gradient from north to south of 18 ‰, with only a short section on the north side lying horizontally. In addition, the tunnel is just up to 120 m at the south exit, which had to be laid in an arc of 300 m radius.
Construction on the tunnel began at the end of December 1903 on the south side. After a short manual drilling on the bottom tunnel in the incline, compressed air ram drilling machines from Bechem and Reetmann could be used and enabled an average excavation of 4 meters per day. In contrast, only 292 meters of tunnels were hand-drilled from the north . The breakthrough occurred on September 23, 1906, 3,406 m from the south portal. The deviations were 49 mm in the side and 11 mm in the height.
On August 1, 1908, the tunnel with the line from Moutier to Solothurn West was opened. To mark the opening, the E. Schenker-Wirz publishing house in Solothurn released an album with 51 images of the construction of the Weissenstein tunnel.
Around 10 kilometers to the west, the Grenchenberg tunnel was opened in 1915 as an access from Delle and Basel via Delémont, Grenchen Nord, Biel and Bern to the Lötschberg line of the Bernese Alpine Railway Company Bern – Lötschberg – Simplon, which was opened in 1913. This and the realignment of traffic flows after Alsace was reintegrated into France in 1918 made the Weissenstein tunnel less important. Freight traffic had a certain importance until the 1970s. For example, car transport trains from the Peugeot plants in Montbéliard and Sochaux were led through the Weissenstein tunnel.
Redevelopment
The tunnel will be renovated from 2021 to 2022. The construction work was originally supposed to start in 2020, but was postponed by a year in order to rehabilitate the entire route at the same time.
prehistory
From 2014, it was examined whether the investment estimated at the time between CHF 100 (renovation for 25 years) and 170 million francs (renovation for 50 years) would be worthwhile for the federal government, or whether a replacement offer with a better cost-benefit ratio was possible, such as the one federal legislation is required in such cases.
On June 8, 2015, a committee “Weissenstein Tunnel Preserve” was founded in Gänsbrunnen in order to pool efforts to maintain the Weissenstein Tunnel and the Solothurn – Moutier railway line. The committee gathers ideas and develops concepts to increase the passenger frequency permanently and thus to raise the cost coverage of the line. Be Angedacht new offers, such as the use of the compound for the binding of the Solothurn Central Plateau region over the reconstructed railway line Belfort-Delle to the railway station Belfort-Montbéliard TGV in Meroux. This was put back into operation with the timetable change on December 9, 2018. Synergies with tourist offers, such as the cable car to the Weissenstein, which reopened in December 2014, and the regional Thal nature park are to be used. The committee presented its arguments for maintaining the Weissenstein tunnel on April 8, 2016 in the participation procedure of the Federal Office of Transport. This is based on an «In-depth study, report on results for participation».
In February 2017, the Federal Office of Transport (FOT) decided to renovate the Weissenstein railway tunnel, thereby addressing the concerns of the regions affected. Your concerns are weighted higher than economic considerations. The renovation is expected to cost around 85 million francs, which the federal government will pay through the rail infrastructure fund. The tunnel is being renovated so that it can be operated for another 25 years.
business
Today the route and the tunnel are operated by BLS Netz AG and the Weissenstein tunnel is driven through in both directions by SBB every hour in around 3 minutes.
Specialty
In 1999, on the occasion of the "Gänsbrunnen Railway Days", the idea of a cinema train through the Weissenstein tunnel was born. Over 800 people took advantage of the unique opportunity to enjoy the special cinema on a BLS car train wagon over two days. An association was founded on December 30, 2000 and has been operating the cinema train ever since. For this purpose, the SOB railcar Abe 4/4 No. 11, built in 1940, was bought in 2001 , revised and given a blue paintwork with the inscription "Ciné Tunnel / Tunnel Kino". At the end of 2014, the railcar was equipped with the ETM safety system required by the Federal Office of Transport. On the outward journey from Oberdorf to Gänsbrunnen, an aperitif is served in the longest cinema in the world . During a stop in the tunnel, the water for this is drawn from an accessible, food-grade source. On the return journey, short films on the tunnel and other topics are shown in freight cars that have been converted into cinema trains.
literature
- Encyclopedia of Railways, 1923, 2nd edition, Volume 10, page 323
Web links
- Solothurn – Moutier - Maroder Weissenstein tunnel is being emergency refurbished - and can be used until 2020. In: Solothurner Zeitung , September 29, 2015
- Peaceful manifestation with anti-tank guns - two firecrackers for maintaining the tunnel. In: Solothurnerzeitung , September 5, 2016
Individual evidence
- ^ "On the opening of the Solothurn-Münster railway". In: album. E. Schenket-Wirz, Solothurn, accessed on July 1, 2016 .
- ↑ Car transport train at the entrance to Solothurn-West 1976. State Archives Canton Bern, accessed on July 1, 2016 .
- ↑ BLS starts renovating the Weissenstein Tunnel in 2021 . BLS. January 11, 2019. Retrieved September 14, 2019.
- ↑ Refurbishment of the Weissensteiner Tunnel costs a three-digit million amount. In: Oltner Tagblatt , March 31, 2014
- ↑ Exemplary struggle for a regional train. In: NZZ.ch , August 13, 2015
- ↑ Article 19a of the Ordinance on Licensing and Financing of Railway Infrastructure (KFEV)
- ↑ Article 19 Paragraph 3 of the Ordinance on Compensation for Regional Passenger Transport (ARPV)
- ↑ Committee on «Preserving the Weissenstein Tunnel». In: www.weissensteintunnel.ch. Retrieved July 1, 2016 .
- ↑ In- depth study, report on results for participation, abridged version. In: so.ch. Retrieved July 1, 2016 .
- ↑ Weissenstein railway tunnel is being renovated. In: bahnonline.ch , January 6, 2018
- ↑ Tunnelkino.ch