Best places to see freight trains in Europe

Hi I am travelling across Germany, Italy, Austria and Czech Republic by car in September. I have looked on the web and there are mentions of Nuremberg being a significant freight hub to see freight trains. Can anyone confirm this and also recommend any other potential places in Italy (Trento and surrounding area); Salzburg (Austria) and Prague?

Andymcw said:

Hi I am travelling across Germany, Italy, Austria and Czech Republic by car in September. I have looked on the web and there are mentions of Nuremberg being a significant freight hub to see freight trains. Can anyone confirm this and also recommend any other potential places in Italy (Trento and surrounding area); Salzburg (Austria) and Prague?

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Whoa, there's a big open question!

The best thing is to research in detail information about the relevant railways using books, regional internet forums, magazines, web sites etc.

Nürnberg has a big marshalling yard, but there are lots of other big freight hubs - and busy freight lines - around Germany.

I recommend you research noted well known freight watching locations. The best places are often but not by any means always, close to a marshalling yard hub.

Bahnbilder.de is a good place to look for photos of particular locations and / or loco classes
http://www.bahnbilder.de/name/bilder/hierarchie1/Deutschland.html


Well known busy spots in Germany include:

Hamburg Harburg

Köln West

Berlin Outer Ring line: http://gwizz.piwigo.com/index?/category/70-april_2013_saarmund_berlin_aussenring


The river Rhine right bank route (anywhere along the route): http://gwizz.zenfolio.com/germany_oct_2011

Hannover

Lehrte

anywhere on the Hannover - Bebra - Wurzburg - München route

Dresden - Decin - Praha (Prague): http://gwizz.piwigo.com/index?/category/191-elbe_gorge_koenigstein_and_bad_schandau
http://gwizz.piwigo.com/index?/category/190-dresden_stetzsch

In April, I saw nearly 40 freights in 4 hours just east of Munchen:
http://gwizz.piwigo.com/index?/category/185-hattenhofen_near_munchen/start-40


If you are travelling by car, you have the advantage of being able to lineside on these routes


In Austria/Italy, one of the main trunk freight routes is the Brenner route Munchen - Innsbruck - Brennero - Bolzano - Trento. Another Austrian trunk route is Salzburg - Tauern tunnel - Villach

Finally, on my April trip to Dresden shown in the picture links above, we cut through the Czech Republic by car. The area along the northern border is an amazing mining/industrial area, like the UK industrial heartlands of 40 years ago. We saw heavy coal trains hauled by clapped out electrics running on a Sunday evening.



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Gordon said:

Whoa, there's a big open question!

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Finally, on my April trip to Dresden shown in the picture links above, we cut through the Czech Republic by car. The area along the northern border is an amazing mining/industrial area, like the UK industrial heartlands of 40 years ago. We saw heavy coal trains hauled by clapped out electrics running on a Sunday evening.

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This was where, around Usti or Decin, perhaps?

Has anyone been to Ostrava recently? I was there abotu 12 yearsw ago. It felt like going the County Durham coalfields when I was a nipper in 1958. All slag heaps and coal dust in the air (think Get Carter and the final scene with the overhead tipper)

Hey thanks, thats great. Really appreciate your help.

70014IronDuke said:

This was where, around Usti or Decin, perhaps?

Has anyone been to Ostrava recently? I was there abotu 12 yearsw ago. It felt like going the County Durham coalfields when I was a nipper in 1958. All slag heaps and coal dust in the air

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We drove from Konigstein (after the last run of the Pacific steam specials at the Dresden festival) to Kurort Oberwiesenthal (for the Fichtelberg steam line) via Teplice, Most, Chomutov. The area round Chomutov was where we saw the moving coal trains, yards full of wagons, and a huge open cast mine.

During the Dresden steam festival we also saw a huge open cast mine in Poland, near the Zittau steam line in south east Germany.

What's the betting accomodation is a darn sight cheaper in this area, from where you can d a day trip to Prague, rather than the other way round.

ps the diesel fuel for the car was dirt cheap too!




Likewise I grew up in the Mansfield area in the 1960s (with pairs of Class 20s passing my primary school) and had family across South Yorkshire



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From Innsbruck to Verona you will almost see the same freight. Except that from Volders-Baumkirchen to Unterberg-Stefansbrücke there is a detour railway avoiding Innsbruck. But than you will also freight going to Landeck. Best place to see freight is certainly Basel BBF.

Gordon said:

Whoa, there's a big open question!



The river Rhine right bank route (anywhere along the route): http://gwizz.zenfolio.com/germany_oct_2011

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I can recommend the Rhine gorge anywhere between Koblenz and Bingen.

Not only do you get a railway on both banks, but wonderful scenery and non stop barge traffic on the river.

Ústí nad Labem and Decin in the Czech Republic are good, as is Prattein in Switzerland.

Also at Stein-Säckingen recently there were 10 freights in 30 mins between 1800 and 1830 on a Monday evening plus lots of passenger hauled trains (Monday in Switzerland is supposed to be quiet!)

Weil am Rhein just up from Basel is good.

Gyor in Hungary is good.

I went to Rotenburg (Wümme) sometime last year, it was packed with freight, i think there were once around every 10 min or so, and they are passing a good amount of speed, which i like I think its on the Hamburg-Bremen line.