Wasgauwaldbahn – Wikipedia

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Bundenthal–Ludwigswinkel
Course book route: –
Route length: 14,5 km
Trade distance: 600 mm (Narrow gauge)
0.0 Bundenthal
(Connection of Wieslauterbahn)
0.5 Bundenthal Straße
2.0 Rumbach
3.5 Nothweiler
4.7 Sheath
7.4 Schönau-Brettelhof
10.2 Fischbach place
10.8 Fischat gbf
12.0 Saarbachhammer
13.1 Reißlerhof
13.7 Ludwigswinkel Ort
14.5 Lager Ludwigswinkel

The Wasgauwaldbahn , also Wasgenwaldbahn or Small train Bundenthal – Ludwigswinkel Called, was a 14.5 km long narrow-gauge railway in Rhineland-Palatinate. It led from the Bundenthal-Rumbach station (formerly Bundenthal) to Ludwigswinkel and existing from 1921 to 1930. The route was originally built as a army field for the French military, which was entertained a warehouse in Ludwigswinkel in connection with the Allied Rhineland occupation until 1930. In Bundenthal-Rumbach there was a connection to the normal-gauge Wieslauterbahn, which also ended there from Hinterei-Weidenthal.

From 1924 there were also passenger traffic on the route. As early as 1930, the thin settlement of the region and the lack of a legal obligation to operate led to the decommissioning and the subsequent dismantling of the route immediately after the retreat of the French from Ludwigswinkel. When building the biosphere house, rails were installed as railings.

prehistory [ Edit | Edit the source text ]

Even before the First World War, there had been efforts in the municipalities of Schönau, Fischbach and Ludwigswinkel, which were called Saarbach, which were called Saarbach in their upper reaches in their upper reaches. With sarcasm, the inhabitants of these places pointed out that Kaltenbach, Bergzabern, Weißenburg and Bitsch are their train stations. An improvement in traffic conditions only occurred when the so -called Wieslauterbahn was opened from Hinterweidenthal to Bundenthal in 1911. Nevertheless, the nearest station at the end point in Bundenthal was still around ten kilometers from the places on the Sauer. A resident mockingly stated in this context:

“Plans have long been forged to bring the train into the Sauer Valley. Government, forestry and mayoral authorities held meetings from time to time. Price with a lot of nice talking everything spoke of the future track, but it didn’t come. It didn’t work over the mountains, too little steam, not by the mountains, too little money ”

– Residents of the Sauer Valley before the First World War [first]

With the outbreak of the First World War, the efforts around a railway line came to a standstill.

Construction and opening [ Edit | Edit the source text ]

After the First World War, the Prussian military training area in the city of Bitsch, which has now been assigned to France (French. Dick ) used by the French military. Since this was not large enough for the intended maneuvers, plans for an expansion to north and east were created. Although the Palatinate, which was part of Bavaria, was occupied by French, the Bavarian Forest Administration declined this. As a reparation performance, the German Reich had to build a troop camp in the small village of Ludwigswinkel in the small village of Ludwigswinkel to reactivate the military training area there and several shooting range as an extension of the base in Bitch. Two divisions were stationed there: a regiment infantry and a artillery department. [2]

Old locomotive shed in Ludwigswinkel (2009)

To supply the troops in the camp of Ludwigswinkel, the French crew already called for the construction of a railway line to transport building materials and supply goods from Bundenthal to the warehouse in 1920. [first] France demanded that the track width of 600 millimeters in the war demanded. [3] After planning the Ludwigshafen railway directorate, however, the railway should be carried out as a fully lane railway. The immediate continuation of the Wieslauterbahn was considered, not least in order to improve the traffic infrastructure of the Sauer Valley communities. There had been corresponding efforts before the First World War. [first] A design by the Ludwigshafen railway directorate provided for the line to run over Niederschlettenbach, Nothweiler, Schönau and Fischbach. After the responsible persons had assumed that the railway would be built in normal gauge, the Reich government in Berlin only allowed a narrow -gauge small railway for cost reasons, as the French side had also sought. [4]

The final route led over Rumbach and the watershed between Wieslauter and Saarbach past the Rumbach Höhe. If possible, it was created within valleys. In the spring of 1921, the actual construction of the route began after initial preparatory work a year earlier. Only material from the Army field from the First World War was used. [4] The superstructure consisted of a gravel bed.

When the shell of the railway line was almost completed, there was a dam slide near Rumbach. Therefore, the slope there was fastened with fascin and stone. The route was opened in 1921. The Koblenz imperial assets were owned by the Reichwerkt administration, the operator of the Landau imperial assets. [5]

Operation and decommissioning [ Edit | Edit the source text ]

After it was initially planned to supply the French troops, the French military administration also released the train from 1924 for public passenger and freight transport. In 1925 it was intended as a job creation measure to extend the railway line to Pirmasens.

In 1927, from Monday to Friday, three mixed trains and four train pairs drove every day, which were only used for passenger transport. All passenger trains only led the third and fourth car class.

On June 30, 1930, the French military had to clear the military training area, which deprived the livelihood basis for the railway line. A year earlier, the military stopped paying the operating costs for the route. Since the railway line did not work cost -covering due to the low demand, the Reich Ministry of Transport considered it unnecessary. At the end of August of the same year, the ministry ordered the company to hire. The municipal regional authorities refused to maintain the operation at their own expense. Since no prospect was taken over for the takeover of the route, it was closed on October 31, 1930.

Parts of the upper building and the car material were sold to Switzerland. The vehicles were scrapped there. [6]

In Fischbach, a street name is reminiscent of the former railway (2010)

Course [ Edit | Edit the source text ]

The route was in the southern Palatinate Forest, the German part of the Wasgau, which gave the route its name. It started at the Bundenthal (-Rumbach) train station right next to the railway systems of the Wieslauterbahn and went west. South of Rumbach there was a larger slope; Then it ran with a larger slope inside the Rumbach valley. This left her temporarily to enter the neighboring Bramtal, whose eastern slope she passed. At Nothweiler there was a curve of 180 degrees, then the railway line led past the opposite bank of the stream there. Then a slope had to be mastered again and the route reached the water sheath of Saarbach and Wieslauter. The route ran back in the Rumbach valley from there. From the Schönau – Brettelhof stop, she followed the course of the Saarbach and ran parallel to the street via Fischbach and Ludwigswinkel. The stays on the go Nothweiler and Schönau – Brettelhof were far from the settlement areas of the relevant communities with distances of up to three kilometers. Over the entire length, the railway line was on the district of today’s Southwest Palatinate district.

Branches [ Edit | Edit the source text ]

In the Bundenthal-Rumbach train station, the track systems and the operations of the narrow-gauge railway west of the Reichsbahn were located. At the end of the route in Ludwigswinkel there was a locomotive shed. [5] The holding on the go Rumbach, Wasserscheide, Schönau- Brettelhof, Fischbach Gbf, Saarbachhammer and Ludwigswinkel.

Initially, six four -axle tender locomotives drove on the route. Later two more three -axis locomotives were available.

Small tipping trolleys and at least 30 brigade cars were used for military transport; The latter was open freight cars. In addition, there was a closed freight car and about a dozen shooting stations for wooden transport.

Four axle passenger cars were used to transport the troops. For the civil traffic opened in 1924, several passenger cars were bought by the meter -gauge state forest railway Ruhpolding – Reit in the Winkl, which had to be converted to the track width of 600 millimeters. [7] Many had oven heating and petroleum lighting. In addition, there were two catering cars on the railway line.

The railway line is still easy to identify today, especially in the low -vegetation. A railway bike path was created on sections. [2] A 1927 fabricate is preserved, which was seen in a special exhibition of the instrument in Nothweiler in August 2010 and is now hanging in the restaurant of the “Zum Salztrippler” restaurant in Rumbach. In Fischbach near Dahn, the street is reminiscent of At the railway embankment to the route within the municipality. The Rumbach reception building is kept in a half -timbered style; The locomotive shed in Ludwigswinkel is also still available. The latter serves as a garage for trucks.

  • Reiner Schedler: Side and narrow-gauge railways in Germany once and now . In: Wolf-Dietger Machel (ed.): Side and narrow-gauge railways in Germany (once & now) (from Rügen to Rosenheim, from Aachen to Zwickau) . Geranova magazine publisher, 1998.
  • Gerd Wolff: German and private tracks . Eisenbahn-Kurier Verlag, Freiburg im Breisgau 1987, ISBN 3-88255-651-X.
  • Karl Unold: The French military training area Ludwigswinkel and the Wasgenwaldbahn. As recruits from Morocco and Algeria 60 years ago in Wasgau. In: Home calendar. The Pirmasenser u. Zweibrücker Land. 1982 ( Online [accessed on August 9, 2015]).
  • Ruth Andrae-Frick: Childhood in the Wasgau, Ludwigswinkel 1983 . , P. 139 ff (chapter: the Kleinbahn)
  • Martin Wenz: Wieslauter-, Wasgenwaldbahn and bus connection , in: Karl-Heinz Jung: Local chronicle Bundenthal from the beginning to the 21st century, Bundenthal or J. , Pp. 316–338 (in it to the Wasgenwaldbahn pp. 333–338)
  1. ↑ a b c Schedler, S. 4
  2. ↑ a b Unold
  3. ↑ Wolff, S. 259
  4. ↑ a b Schedler, S. 6
  5. ↑ a b Wolff, S. 257
  6. ↑ Schedler, S. 7
  7. ↑ Wolff, S. 261
  8. ↑ http://www.morr-siedelsbrunn.de/pfalz/wasgauwaldbahn/ , read out on February 19, 2022
  9. ↑ https://www.petersbaechel.de/wasgenwaldbahn.html# , read out on February 20, 2022