Der Tunnel - Verbindungsbahn der S-Bahn Stuttgart

It's rare that railroad projects are documented in vast detail from the perspectives of civil engineering, economics, and social impact in a single book. "Der Tunnel" is one of the exceptions. It describes design and construction of the central element of the S-Bahn Stuttgart: The city tunnel between Hauptbahnhof (main station) and Schwabstrasse, and it's underground continuation to Vaihingen via Universität. In over 35 detail-loaded chapters the authors work through early plans and financing of the project, discuss in detail the various construction sites within the city core, including engineering challenges of constructing a tunnel in the middle of a bustling city with difficult geology. They keep the high level of detail as they discuss the concerns and engineering challenges building the Hasenbergtunnel towards Vahingen.

Along the way they touch on such diverse topics as re-routing of sewers, tram lines, and car traffic; digging next to, or under, historic building; construction impact litigation; project financing; operational aspects resulting from tight headways of S-Bahn trains; supply and material logistics; geology of Stuttgart's underground; triangulating underground with high accuracy and verifying construction to plan; etc. etc. etc.

Hamburg method vs. Berlin method of open tunnel construction - spot the difference!

In addition to the general civil engineering aspects of the project, what I found most interesting are the many descriptions of when things were built differently than originally planned, or when things went wrong unexpectedly and what to do about it. Above is an example of how a different tunnel construction method was chosen in Rotebühlstrasse near Feuersee to get a narrower construction site and gain just under two meters extra space between the construction site and buildings lining the street to facilitate surface traffic and building access.

The book has answers for civil engineering questions I asked myself when riding the train. E.g. the lower half of the Hasenbergtunnel is constructed as two single-track tunnels that merge to a single two-track tunnel in the upper half towards Universität. You can hear the difference as the tunnel transitions when riding the train between Schwabstrasse and Universität. The reason is due to geology. The lower half of the tunnel lies in keuper gypsum ("Gipskeuper") which can develop a lot of pressure on the tunnel bores due to swelling of the gypsum in combination with water. Constructing two smaller circular bores made it simpler and more cost-effective to provide for the necessary fortification of the tunnel against rock pressure in this stratum. In the upper part of the tunnel, the gypsum over time has been washed out from the keuper rock and thus it can't develop the same amount of rock pressure on the tunnel bore. Building a larger diameter two-track tunnel was more economical in this section.

While I was studying at Universität Stuttgart, I used the infrastructure described in this book daily, so I -- along with many others that lived and live in the Stuttgart area -- have developed a special relationship with the S-Bahn. We use it daily and take it for granted. This book is an interesting look behind the scenes of what goes into such major infrastructure projects, and also provides historical perspective on changes in planning and construction methods during the early 1970's and early 80's, a period of transition towards a computerized world. 

"Der Tunnel" (ISBN: 3-925565-01-9) is written in German, was published in 1985, and can occasionally be found secondhand on abebooks, booklooker, or other sources for antiquarian books.

Reading Material

These days cross-Atlantic trips are a rarity. We used the opportunity of my wife's family visit to bring along some of the items that had accumulated at my parent's house over the last 9 months. I now have plenty of stuff to read over the upcoming winter ..

Zugschlusssignal

The Zugschlusssignal ("end of train signal") must be mounted at the end of the last car of a train. It is made from metal and there are usually two such markers at the end of the train. Station agents and operators along the tracks observe passing trains and note the complete passing once they see the Zugschlusssignal.

This marker is commonly used on freight trains, while passenger cars usually have lighted red end of train markers.

Wouldn't it be interesting to include proper placement of such signal in the operations scheme of our model railroads? 

Untergroeningen: Station building research

[ Untergroeningen posts ]

Untergroeningen station buildings in 2004

This photo from Wikipedia nicely illustrates the building arrangement in Untergroeningen. The locomotive shed is on the left in the rear. Across the tracks is a large storage shed / barn-like structure. Track 1 is partially embedded in asphalt before the station building. There's a small outbuilding with restrooms between the station building and the shed. The station building has an integrated storage / warehouse area and loading ramp facing track 1. The challenge is what did this look like 30 years earlier?

I have been contemplating how to model this ensemble. The locomotive shed with its distinctive water tower and attached tool shop in the rear needs to be represented, and I already made a partial paper mock-up for use with Auhagen parts. The shed and toilet building are pretty straightforward. I really like the tree between the two buildings.

However, I've been going back and forth on the station building. It's rather unattractive, and I have not been able to find any photos showing the street side of the station building that would be very visible on my module. The photo above shows the building with a brown siding that wraps around the side, too. All photos I found on the Internet (e.g. here with some shots from 1983) show the building with this ugly brown siding that I really don't like.

So I thought about alternatives. We are in Wuerttemberg. I could use one of the standardized Wuerttemberg station buildings. Faller makes a very nice model of the three-story Gueglingen station, which is type IIIa. So I ordered that and have it on the shelf. While at it, I also noticed that the station included in the Faller "Haltingen" set, which I got as a present a few years ago, is a bastardized version of the Gueglingen kit with the second story and waiting hall removed. It kind of looks similar to the type I plan.  What bugged me about this approach is that the weg was a private railway, and they didn't use the standardized plans in any of their buildings.

Next idea: Transplant one of the prettier weg buildings to Untergroeningen. E.g. Sulzbach has a nice half-timbered station building that still stands today and is now occupied by a restaurant.

Next I took another look at the photos of Untergroeningen in Hermann Buernheim's book "Wuerttembergische Eisenbahngesellschaft: Die Geschichte einer bedeutenden Privatbahn". Low and behold on page 139 is a photo from 1973 (yay!) showing the Untergroeningen station building with a wood siding on only one side of the warehouse side of the building (YAY!)  While the rest of the building is rather bland, that can be modeled. ... There is no tree between the outhouse and the shed and the platform is very low just barely above the rails.

After the success on Google Maps with Sulzbach, I double-checked if can get any additional information out of Google Maps. Sure enough: While the service facilities and all tracks are gone and have been replaced with industry, the station building itself is still standing. The satellite view gives a good idea about the roof structure of the building.

The paved area to the right of the station building leads to the former loading ramp at the end of track 1. The large shed was to the left of the loading ramp.

Update March 17, 2020:
To my delight I did find a street side view of the station building and the restroom building (with attached garage!) on Vergessene Bahnen.

Adventures in Old Freight Paperwork: Germany, Car 841 3032-9 Bremerhaven - Berlin

I received some original paperwork that came off a freight car numbered 841 3032-9 in Berlin-Lichterfelde West in the summer of 1980.

According to the number range table in Stefan Carstens' book "Gueterwagen Band 1", car number 841 3 032-9 is UIC type Ichs377. It's an insulated refrigerator car (I), with meat hooks (c), heavy insulation (h), and permitted to run at speeds of up to 100 km/h (s). Deutsche Bundesbahn apparently had 29 of these cars.
According to "Gueterwagen Band 2", these cars were introduced in 1956 as German class Tmehs50 with electrical heating and steam heating for use in passenger trains. In 1968, the cars were relabeled to UIC class Ichqrs377. Later, the heating connections -- (q)=electrical, (r)=steam -- were removed, and the cars became class Ichs377. The last cars went out of service in 1985. This was a common car in the 60's and 70's for transporting goods that needed to be kept frozen.

I have a couple of these cars in service on the Welztalbahn. The Maerklin model of this car is a bit shortened and lacks the fine details of other models, but gives an idea what the car looked like.

The trip I'd like to focus on for the rest of this post started on July 29th, 1980 in Bremerhaven-Geestemünde, where car 841 3032-9 was cleaned inside out. This was recorded with a "Gewaschen"-Zettel on the car.

The next day, car 841 3032-9 was spotted at the Transthermos icing facility in Geestemünde. The loading doors to the ice bunkers at the ends of the car were opened and water ice loaded. Overnight, the car was put on a transfer run to Bremerhaven-Kaiserhafen and spotted at the Frigus cold storage facility on the banks of the Weser river, so that it was ready for loading by 6:00am on July 31st. By that time the ice loaded the previous day had cooled the car down to about 4 degree Celsius.

Frigus cold storage was built in 1920 and was powered by a huge steam engine. KKA has an interesting article about the facility, including photos of the building and the cooling machinery. By 1980, Frigus was used by the U.S. Army for transloading frozen meat from ships into train cars.

Here is the Hauptzettel, moving the loaded car to Berlin. The car weighs 14 tons. It's loaded with 11 tons of meat, for a total weight of 25 tons. The car is treated as a regular freight car, but gets special routing in the vicinity of Bremerhaven, hence the use of Hauptzettel for "Sonderplanwagen".

The car is switched from the Frigus facility to transfer run 66497 Bremerhaven-Kaiserhafen to Bremerhaven-Lehe. In Lehe, the car is put on train 38045. Note how the names of cities are stamped onto the Hauptzettel.

At first I thought that the car would simply enter the regular car routing system of Deutsche Bundesbahn. Maybe be routed from Lehe to Bremen Rbf and on to the border at Helmstedt via Braunschweig. However, upon further reflection that doesn't make much sense. The Allied Forces occupied Germany. This was a movement to resupply military installations in technically enemy country. It was important to protect military supply lines. The 38... number range was used for military movements. Hence 38045 was likely Dm38045 and ran directly from Bremerhaven-Lehe to Berlin Lichterfelde West as "Interzonenzug". It was not integrated with regular car routing.

There were also regular military passenger movements between West Germany and Berlin. Germans were not allowed to use these military trains. Verbotene Zuege has more information.

Here is some additional paperwork. As I pointed out earlier this car was loaded in a facility used by the U.S. Army. I'm not sure what the purpose of this sheet is and whether it traveled with the Hauptzettel on the car or was kept with waybills. The form shows weight information, origin and destination, as well as where the car enters the GDR on it's way to Berlin: Helmstedt. The car was sealed while in transit, and was to be delivered to TSA EURSO BERLIN WK4TC8 . Maybe one of my American friends with army background can make more sense of this.

From 1947 to 1994 Berlin Lichterfelde West station was used by the Berlin Brigade of the U.S. Army for military traffic with West Germany. 

Once again, this was a fun exercise and I learned quite a few things just from trying to understand almost 40 year old paperwork. 

Northwest Railway Museum: Outside artifacts

Along the road between Snoqualmie and Snoqualmie Falls is an outside storage area where the Northwest Railway Museum keeps more artifacts that are slowly rotting away. This 2-6-6-2 was built 1928 by Baldwin and was donated to the museum in 1965. This engine pulled trains for the museum.

The steam crane is almost begging for backlit photos with the hook, so here you go.

This automobile box car was built for the Great Northern in 1929. The side-doors are extra-wide and the dreadnaught full steel-end doors at the A end can be opened for automobile loading, too. There existed similarly equipped box cars in Germany at roughly the same time.

This 10,000 gallon riveted tank car was built in 1929 and in revenue service until 1972. Later it was used by the museum to haul waste oil for the steam locomotives from Seattle and finally retired in 1989, when rail service to Snoqualmie ended.

Snoqualmie Falls Hydropower Museum

Generator 5 was installed in the underground cavity of plant 1 at Snoqualmie Falls in 1905. It has a generation capacity of 5600 kilowatts. It uses a Francis turbine, which is more efficient than the Pelton wheels used in the other 4 generators installed at plant 1.

The water enters the turbine from the sides and then falls straight down from the center of the turbine into a draft tube.

The energy of the flowing water is transferred to the shaft of the turbine in form of torque. The shaft is connected to the generator, visible in the rear in the photo at the top of this post.

In 2011 the plant was modernized and generator 5 was moved from plant 1 to the hydropower museum.

"Wow!"

The shops building was moved here from its original site and has various artifacts and equipment that was removed from the plant's underground cavity and control room.

Control panel.

Knife switches.

Snoqualmie Depot

The Snoqualmie Depot is the oldest continuously operated train station in Washington State, because the offices of the Northwest Railway Museum moved into the depot before the last BNSF offices moved out in 1975. Several artifacts are presented around the depot.

The restored freight room hosts the Museum Book Store with more exhibits.

The item that excited me the most here is the interlocking machine that used to be located at Black River Junction where the Northern Pacific Railroad, the Chicago, Milwaukee, & Pudget Sound Railroad, and the Pacific Coast Railroad meet, ten miles south of Seattle Union Station.

This must have been a quite busy junction. The tables in the lower half show the possible routes and which levers need to be set to reverse (i.e. not normal) for that route in which sequence, so that turnouts and signals are set correctly. The various pictograms on the board are interesting, too. Even the tower location is marked.

Outside the depot ALCO RSD-4 and several cars were moved around by a switcher. Of the many photos I took of #201 in varying settings, I like this shot in the bright sun in the park behind the depot the most.

Northwest Railway Museum

The Northwest Railway Museum has a modern shed just East of downtown Snoqualmie with a small but relevant collection of artifacts and rolling stock from the days when the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, and logging companies dominated the area.

This Fairbanks Moose H12-44 switcher (Engine #1) is nicely restored.

It's primary duty was to haul lumber from the White River Mill to the Northern Pacific Railway at Enumclaw, WA.

The caboose usually used with #1 is also in the collection of the museum and restored on the outside.

Not all rolling stock is this nicely restored. However, with the large train shed building, they are at least not rotting away exposed to the elements.

I liked this NP reefer, and especially the description how oranges from California were prepared for their travels north and packed in refrigerated cars.

There's more information about the museum and he exhibits at trainmuseum.org.

DV 605: Gueterbefoerderungsvorschrift - Ortsdienst

I recently picked up the rule book DV 605 that goes with the forms I got last year. Now I can learn how to use the forms properly. ... Not surprisingly, it's a lot of text.

Schnellzug 204

In this film from the 1960's, Deutsche Bundesbahn shows the various kinds of control tower technology in use at that time. Today we'd call this an infotainment film. Lots of Zeitgeist.

Lokfuehrer Henschel

Eine SDR Reportage von 1964. Koestliche Moderation, und viele Details an der Strecke.

DV 605 Hauptzettel examples

Hauptzettel for regular freight loads

Hauptzettel are found in a frame on the outside of freight cars behind a wire mesh (see this post for examples). So far I've used examples for these forms found on the Internet. I didn't know what exact time frame they were from, but adjusted for my needs to guide making car cards and way bills that resemble the prototype forms.
Now that I have the appendix for DV 605 from 1970, the next time I revise way bills I can try to replicate the look of these forms as much as feasible to fit the time frame of my layout.

Of course, I just finished making car cards and way bills for most cars on my layout. I'm not going to throw away that work, but rather try out the system for a while and then make adjustments as needed.

Hauptzettel for preferred freight loads

Hauptzettel for express freight. There are lots of variations of this form...

Preferred freight where the whole car goes to the same destination freight terminal

Preferred freight as before, but the car takes a specified route / trains.
There's a similar form for cars where part of the freight is loaded/unloaded en-route.

As you can tell, the look gets increasingly complicated as transport patterns get more complicated. I'll try to keep this simple for now and iterate slowly. 

Next order of business is to finish clean up on the Welztalbahn and get operation sessions going again.

Wagenuebergangsuebersichten 1984/85 und Richtpunktcodes

[An English version of this post can be found here]

Eine weitere Ebay Auktion. Ein weiterer Stapel Altpapier. Diesmal ist es ein deutsches Gueterzugkursbuch mit dem Jahresfahrplan 1984/85. Das Gueterzugkursbuch zeigt fuer jeden Bahnhof welche Gueterzuege wann wohin fahren. Was kann man damit anfangen? Mal sehen ...

Letztes Jahr habe ich einen Artikel geschrieben in dem ich spekuliert habe was der Richtpunktcode auf einem Hauptzettel bedeutet, den ich im Februar 1987 auf Gleis 5 in Ludwigsburg fotografiert habe. Hier ist eine Ausschnittvergroesserung des Hauptzettels von diesem Foto.

Ein paar Sachen, die mir gleich auffallen: Die handschriftlichen Eintragungen oben rechts sind Gewichte fuer Wagen (19,2), Ladung (22,1), und Gesamt (41,3) in Tonnen. Unter den Gewichten ist die Wagennnummer 21 80 238 4? 831-1? . Die Nummer ist schwer zu lesen, daher muss ich fuer einige Zahlen raten.
Der Wagen wurde in Neheim-Huesten mit Stueckgut beladen, und geht nach Leonberg. Der Wagen laeuft direkt vom Versendungsbahnhof zum Zielbahnhof ohne Zwischenhalte. Ich vermute, dass der Wagen von einem Versender zu einem Empfaenger unterwegs ist. Vielleicht lief die Rechnung auf Basis von Stueckgutraten?
Ich weiss nicht fuer was die Nummer 2196 steht, oder was die kaum lesbaren Zahlen unter dem Richtpunktcode bedeuten.

Schauen wir mal mit welchen Zuegen dieser Wagen unterwegs war. Ich glaube, ich habe den Wagen damals an einem Samstag in Ludwigsburg fotografiert.

Die Reise begann in Neheim-Huesten. Hier ist die entsprechende Seite vom Gueterzugkursbuch.

Neheim-Huesten hat Richtpunktcode 246. Von hier werden mehrere Satelliten in der Naehe, die in der unteren Haelfte der Tabelle aufgelistet sind, bedient. Fuer regulaere Wagen gibt es nur eine Route von Neheim-Huesten, und das ist Zug 65536 nach Hagen-Vorhalle, Abfahrt in Stunde 19 (also zwischen 18:00 und 18:59). Hagen-Vorhalle hat Richtpunktcode 230.

230 Hagen-Vorhalle ist ein grosser Rangierbahnhof in Norddeutschland wie man an der grossen Zahl Zuegen sehen kann. Die schmale Indextabelle auf der linken Seite zeigt, dass Zug 65536 der letzte Zug ist, der in Stunde 19 ankommt, und weisst ihm Wagenuebergangsnummer 198 zu. Die Wagenuebergangsnummer wird zum Finden des Anschlusszuges benutzt, auf den es ein Wagen schaffen wird.

Jetzt betrete ich das Reich der Spekulation. Der Planer im Rangierbahnhof hat eine Tabelle, die per Richtpunktcode und Wagenuebergangsnummer den Anschlusszug auswaehlt. Ich vermute, dass in dieser Tabelle fuer code 731 ein Anschlusszug nach 720 Kornwestheim ausgewaehlt wird (Ich erklaere den Grund fuer meine Vermutung weiter unten).

Oben auf der rechten Seite ist eine direkte Route von 230 Hagen-Vorhalle nach 720 Kornwestheim. Da ich vermute, dass ich den Wagen in Ludwigsburg an einem Samstag gesehen habe, muesste er also Freitag abend in Hagen-Vorhalle gewesen sein. Wagenuebergangsnummer 198 faellt in den Bereich 54 - 250 von Zug 53911, dessen Verkehrstage in einer dreistelligen Zahl codiert sind. Eine Tabelle zum Aufloesen dieser Zahlen liegt dem Gueterzugkursbuch bei. 062 bedeutet Dienstag bis Samstag. Dieser Wagen sollte also Hagen-Vorhalle mit Zug 53911 Samstag morgen in Stunde 2 abfahren (also zwischen 1:00 und 1:59).

Eine Anfahrt nach ein Uhr morgens bedeutet, dass der Rangierbahnhof 6 Stunden Zeit hat die Wagen von Zug 65536 in die ensprechenden abgehenden Zuege zu sortieren. Wenn man aber die Uebergangszeiten in Hagen-Vorhalle durch sieht, sieht es so aus, dass die kuerzeste Uebergangszeit nur 90 Minuten ist. Das ist ganz schoen knapp. Der Zug muss ankommen in die Ankunftsgruppe, die Kupplungen geloest werden, und ueber den Ablaufberg geschoben werden, um die Wagen zu sortieren. Kurz vor Abfahrtszeit des Zuges werden die Wagen zusammengeschoben und gekuppelt, und die Bremsen getestet.

Nun schauen wir in die Tabelle fuer 720 Kornwestheim. Das Foto zeigt die zweite Seite der Tabelle fuer Kornwestheim. Der erste Zug in der Tabelle ist 53911. Wie praktisch.

53911 ist der letzte Zug, der in Stunde 11 ankommt. Damit liegt die wahrscheinliche Uhrzeit zu der ich den Wagen fotografiert habe zwischen 10:30 und 11 Uhr morgens, ... wenn wir mal annehmen, dass der Zug puenktlich war. Die Indextabelle weisst 53911 die Wagenuebergangsnummer 49 zu. Es gibt eine direkte Route nach 731 Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen von Kornwestheim, und dies ist die Erklaerung fuer die Vermutung, dass Hagen-Vorhalle Wagen fuer Richtpunktcode 731 nach Kornwestheim schickt.
In der Abfahrtstabelle fuer 731 Stg-Zuffenhausen finden wir fuer Wagenuebergangsnummer 49 Zug 64157 als die regulaere Variante, aber heute ist Samstag, und 64157 faehrt heute nicht. Stattdessen schauen wir unter Abweichungen in der Zeile fuer Fr127-Sa78 finden Zug 64159 der in Kornwestheim in Stunde 21 abfaehrt und nur samstags faehrt (Verkehrstagcode 002).

Endlich kommen wir nach Zuffenhausen, dem Ziel-Richtpunktcode 731. Zug 64159 kommt in Stunde 21 and und bekommt Wagenuebergangsnummer 40.

Der Zielbahnhof des Wagens ist Leonberg, der ein Satellit von Zuffenhausen an der Strecke nach Calw ist, die ich schon mal in diesem Blog erwaehnt habe. Die Tabelle unten zeigt, dass Montag bis Freitag Zug 69100 um 6:00Uhr morgens nach Leonberg faehrt. Samstags faehrt Zug 69102 um 9:00Uhr morgens. Sonntags sind keine Anschlusszuege vorgesehen.

Somit wird der Wagen seinen Sonntag in Zuffenhausen verbracht haben, und am folgenden Montag mit Zug 69100 die letzten paar Kilometer nach Leonberg gefahren sein.

Ich hatte viel Spass mich durch 30 Jahre alten Papierkram zu wuehlen, und heraus zu finden wo ein Wagen den ich als Teenager fotografiert habe her kam, warum er dort war, und wo er danach hinging.