After Berlin-Brandenburg airport opened, there was a regular (every 2 hours) Intercity train direct to Dresden. It started somewhere on the Baltic coast, I think. A few years back this was disrupted by major works somewhere in the Berlin area. Looking up the DB Navigator app, I can see that this isn't running at present. Does anyone know if this service has discontinued completely, or if there are still works ongoing and we can expect direct trains sometime in the best future?
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Berlin Airport (BER) to Dresden
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Fragezeichnen
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Hard to believe perhaps, but the construction of the rail link to the BER Airport, which was planned to open in 2011 and actually opened in 2020 is still under construction. When it finally does a lot of services will be redirected to run via the Airport, including this one.
Since May these trains are no longer calling at the BER Airport due to construction works. They are still running from Warnemünde/Rostock to Dresden via Berlin Hbf and Berlin Südkreuz.
I don't know if the will return to calling at the airport when the construction works are finished in December.
I don't know if the will return to calling at the airport when the construction works are finished in December.
Jamesrob637
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Can't believe the rail link to BER isn't yet completed.
However, a nice way of getting from Central Berlin to BER can be via Ludwigsfelde
However, a nice way of getting from Central Berlin to BER can be via Ludwigsfelde
U-Bahnfreund
Member
The BER Line itself is opened, but the Dresdner Bahn between Mahlow and Berlin Südkreuz will only be finished by December.
For regional trains, the difference can be seen in this document (for whatever reason, this is a zip containing one pdf): https://unternehmen.vbb.de/fileadmi.../Bahnverkehr/nes-liniennetz-2022-und-2025.zip the Airport Shuttle train FEX will run via Südkreuz, every 15 minutes. In addition several other trains will go there
For regional trains, the difference can be seen in this document (for whatever reason, this is a zip containing one pdf): https://unternehmen.vbb.de/fileadmi.../Bahnverkehr/nes-liniennetz-2022-und-2025.zip the Airport Shuttle train FEX will run via Südkreuz, every 15 minutes. In addition several other trains will go there
Thanks everyone. I have now been able to look up what's happening with the Dresdener Bahn. The original S-bahn line is being upgraded to take intercity and regional DB trains. Quite what's going to happen to intercity trains via the airport isn't clear, but the FEX airport express will be rerouted that way to give a 20 minute run to Berlin Hbf
Not quite. It’s more the case of restoring / reinstating the long-distance (Fernbahn) tracks for basically the first time in 80 years. Imagine the WCML having been diverted from somewhere like Watford Junction into Liverpool Street after 1945, leaving the DC lines and an unofficial nature reserve. It’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s close.
I guessed as much, and I was a bit lazy with my wording. The line was severed by the Berlin Wall after 1961 so the S-bahn out of the centre terminated at Lichtenrade.
(Edited after a bit of extra research)
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indeed - and run at a massive loss to the Reichsbahn thanks to a boycott by West Berliners after 1961 until the remaining western lines were taken over by the West Berlin authorities in 1984. What happened after that was rather shaped by world events!
OTOH it produced completion by the 70s of the pre-war plan to build the equivalent to a freight bypass ring around London so aggregate and container flows would not be constrained by and have no effect whatsoever on the North London line.
Indeed - though ironically freight was not the main reason for its construction.
Jamesrob637
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Schönefeld must be one of the busiest German stations for freight outside of the Rheinland.
Undoubtedly - but the prime reason for building the BAR was political as it ended East Berlin’s dependence on lines passing through the western half of the city. Ways could have been found to re-route freight much further out. Rerouting workers from Potsdam, Teltow et al on the satellite trains was bad enough, but would have been impossible without the BAR. So yes, freight was a massive beneficiary, but the prime mover was sticking two fingers up at Konrad Adenauer (and staunching the haemorrhaging E German economy)
As it's my thread, I'll flex the topic somewhat! Does anyone know if the Dresdener Bahn went back into operation as, presumably a 4-track route combining mainline and S-bahn, after WW2 and before 1961? My hazy knowledge tells me that there were three rail routes agreed/allowed between West Berlin and the zones of Germany controlled by the Western allies. As the Dresdener Bahn exited the city centre via the US zone in Berlin, I guess it might not have been revived by the Soviets/East Germans. But rail connections from East Berlin to Saxony and Prague, avoiding West Berlin, would have been very difficult before the BAR was constructed.
HS2isgood
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Teltow was bused, no one used the Sputnik rounders from there.
The line from Genshagener Heide to Gruenauer Kreuz was opened in 1951 so after that trains from the Dresden direction went that way towards Ostkreuz and the old Hbf / Ostbahnhof. From 1945 - 51 they would have used the old route from the Anhalter Bf but very much on a provisional basis - definitely not 4 tracks. Indeed much of the route further out (in common with much of the DR network) was singled to provide reparations in kind to the USSR.
Transit points to West Berlin after 1961 were Wannsee/ Griebnitzsee (passengers), Wannsee/Drewitz (goods), Spandau/Staaken (goods only till 1976) and of course Friedrichstrasse.
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Sir Felix Pole
Established Member
Services to Berlin Anhalter Banhof (the principal pre-war terminus for Dresden and the South) were restored in 1947 despite it being severely damaged by bombing. The wrecked train shed roof was removed in 1948. It was, however, in West Berlin so closed in 1952, and services diverted instead to Ostbanhof via the newly opened Ring. Part of the portico at Anhalter Bhf. still remains.
..bussed out to the Sputnikzuege on the Aussenring, OK.
I was lucky enough to make it just in time (February 1989 - so just before any unravelling began). My first experience of the route in question (Dresden - Berlin and on to Hamburg) was in 1994 - fairly conventionally for then with a 112 to the then Berlin Hbf, thence with 2x218 via the Stadtbahn, Pichelsberg (now S-Bahn only), Wustermark, now-closed line to Nauen then on to Hamburg - total journey time by IC 5 hours and 23 minutes.