Anhalt Railway

The Anhalt railway (German: Anhalter Bahn), most commonly referred to as the Berlin-Halle railway (German: Bahnstrecke Berlin-Halle), is a twin-track, electrified main line found in the German city-state of Berlin, and the states of Brandenburg and Sachsen-Anhalt. The railway was originally built and managed by the Berlin-Anhaltische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft.

The Anhalt railway travels from Berlin via Jüterbog and Wittenberg to Halle (Saale). The line is part of the Line 1 of Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T).

1 History
2 References
3 External links

History

Please also see main article: Berlin-Anhaltische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft

Early history and construction

The Berlin-Anhaltische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft (BAE) was one of the most important railway companies in Germany for about four decades in the 19th century. In addition to the main Anhalt Railway, the BAE built a network of important railway connections between Berlin and the northern parts of the Kingdom of Saxony, the Prussian Province of Saxony, and the duchy of Anhalt, with a total length of 430 kilometers at its apex.

In 1840/1841, the Anhalter Bahn of the BAE, running from the Anhalter Bahnhof in Berlin via Jüterbog, Wittenberg, and Dessau to Köthen, was put into service. In Köthen a connection was possible via the Magdeburg-Leipziger Eisenbahn to Halle and Leipzig. In 1859, the trip between Berlin and Halle/Leipzig was considerably shortened with the opening of the direct connection between Wittenberg and Bitterfeld.

Prior to World War I

The Anhalt railway was one of the most important long-distance railways in Germany at the time of its opening. Some of the first express trains traveled from Berlin via Köthen to Halle, Leipzig, Frankfurt am Main and Munich, as well as to Dresden, Prague, and Vienna via Jüterbog-Röderau. The railway also allowed a connection between Berlin, Vienna, Rome, and Athens.

Part of the Deutsche Reichsbahn

Starting in 1923, one of the first long-distance express trains (FD-Zug) traveled from Berlin via Halle and Erfurt to Frankfurt. Starting in 1935, express multiple unit electric railcars provided the same service.

After World War II

The property of the Anhalt railway suffered major damage during World War II, and was only repaired in critical areas. After the partition of Berlin, the Deutsche Reichsbahn (East Germany) ran express service trains to stations in East Berlin. It was not until 1951, and the completion of the first sections of the Berlin outer ring, that this connection was possible coming from Halle or Leipzig. The connection to Berlin, and the heavily damaged Anhalter Bahnhof in Berlin-Kreuzberg, was completed on the 18th of May 1952. The internal East German long-distance traffic traveled to East Berlin to the terminus stations in Berlin Ostbahnhof, Lichtenberg or Schöneweide. Regional service trains ended in Teltow until the construction of the Berlin Wall, where connections to the Berlin S-Bahn using the Anhalt Suburban Line were possible.

After the construction of the Wall, the section to Teltow became a branch line. Some of the regional service trains, coming from Ludwigsfelde, were routed across the Außenring to Schönefeld and Schöneweide, but in general, the passenger service offerings were moderate.

However, in terms of long-distance traffic between Berlin and Halle/Leipzig, the railway was one of the busiest lines in East Germany. For example, in 1989, on the section Berlin-Bitterfeld, there were more than 30 express trains running throughout the year, to which were added trains running just during the summer or on weekends. About half of these trains stopped in Bitterfeld and Wittenberg, some stopped in Jüterbog, and a few stopped in Luckenwalde. Express service trains, some coming from the Baltic Sea coast, traveled via Halle and Erfurt to Meiningen, via Leipzig to Zwickau and Aue as well as to Gera and Saalfeld. Trains also left the network of the Reichsbahn and traveled from Berlin to Karlsbad, and from Rostock to Munich. Most of the transit trains from Berlin to West Germany traveled on a route via Dessau, and only came onto the Anhalt railway at Bitterfeld; only in rare cases did these trains use the line from the branching point at Dennewitz near Jüterbog.

Starting in 1976, the railway was integrated as one of its central sections into the new City Express (Städteexpress) network of the Deutsche Reichsbahn (East Germany), especially the section Berlin–Bitterfeld.

List of City-Express-trains (Ex) on the Berlin-Halle railway (as of: 31 May 1991)

Ex 100/107 Elstertal Gera–Leipzig–Berlin
Ex 160/167 Sachsenring Zwickau–Berlin
Ex 150/157 Rennsteig Meiningen–Suhl–Erfurt–Berlin
Ex 151/156 Berliner Bär Berlin–Leipzig–Erfurt
Ex 162/163 Thomaner Leipzig–Berlin
Ex 166/161 Lipsia Leipzig–Berlin

On the 19th of January 1988, in Forst Zinna (near Jüterbog), an express service train, traveling at 120 km/h, crashed into a tank of the Soviet Red Army, which was sitting on the tracks at a railway crossing, killing 6, and injuring 33.

After 1990

The Anhalter Bahn lost some of its significance with the German reunification. The transit trains lost their special status with the removal of border crossings between East and West Germany, and the City Express service was discontinued on the 31st of May 1991. The first Intercity and InterRegio trains ran at off-peak times, and did not present a service improvement, and synchronized schedules were not introduced until later years.

After reunification, these trains used the railway:

Line 8 − Berlin–Leipzig–Nürnberg–München.
IR-Line − Berlin–Halle–Erfurt–Frankfurt am Main

Long-distance service from Berlin to the south and west was routed from 1998 on the Hanover–Berlin high-speed railway and on the Hanover–Würzburg high-speed railway to Frankfurt, Munich, and Basel. Even the connection between Berlin and Munich was made in a shorter time on these routes compared to the use of the Anhalt railway.

In 1991, the expansion of the Berlin-Halle/Leipzig railway was started as part of a set of transport projects in connection with German reunification (Verkehrsprojekt Deutsche Einheit (VDE)), with project number 8.3. This work resulted in the achievement of top speeds of 160 km/h by the mid-1990s on the line. For a further improvement of speeds up to 200 km/h, it would be necessary to remove numerous railway crossing points on the route. In 1998 it was estimated that at the conclusion of the project, which was supposed to be completed in 1999, 3.5 billion Deutsche Mark were to have been invested, and the trip time between Berlin and Halle/Leipzig was to have been reduced to under one hour^[1]. The project did not see its completion until 2006.

The railway improvements resulted in the conversion in 2002 of the InterCity Line 8 to the use of InterCityExpress trains with tilting technology. The decision to adopt the plan to rebuild the inner city rail lines in Berlin, which was agreed upon by the Deutsche Bahn, the federal government of Germany, and the city government of Berlin, meant that the sections of the Anhalt railway in the center of Berlin were rehabilitated in short order. The new, centrally located Berlin Hauptbahnhof was to be reached via the section of the Anhalt and Dresden railways in the southern part of the city. In addition, between 2005 and 2006 the line between Berlin and Leipzig, which includes all of the Anhalt railway, was expanded to handle top speeds of up to 200 km/h. The cost of this expansion was put at 1.642 billion Euros as of the end of 2007^[2]. Further investment of 6 million Euros is still to be made.

On the new long-distance tracks of the Anhalt railway, which were put into service on the 28th of May 2006, ICE trains travel in the direction of Leipzig, Nuremberg, and Munich, and several Regional-Express trains also use the line.

References

^ ... und ab 1999 in einer Stunde von Berlin nach Halle/Leipzig. In: Eisenbahn-Kurier, Nr. 278, November 1998, ISSN 0170-5288, p. 21.
^ Federal Ministry for Transport, Construction, and City development (Bundesministerium für Verkehr, Bau und Stadtentwicklung): Sachstandsbericht Verkehrsprojekte Deutsche Einheit, July 2008

External links

Anhalter Bahn at bahnstrecken.de - in German
Bahnstrecken im Süden Berlins (includes historical and actual sections about the Anhalt railway) - in German

Berlin–Palermo railway axis

Berlin–Halle · Halle/Leipzig–Erfurt · Erfurt–Nuremberg · Nuremberg–Munich · Munich–Rosenheim · Rosenheim–Kufstein · Kufstein–Wörgl · Wörgl–Innsbruck · Innsbruck bypass · Innsbruck–Franzensfeste (Brenner Base Tunnel) · Franzensfeste–Verona · Milan/Verona–Bologna · Bologna–Florence · Florence–Rome · Rome–Naples · Naples–Salerno · Salerno–Reggio Calabria^(it) · Strait of Messina Bridge · Messina–Palermo^(de) ·