Trains that pass thru but dont stop in a country

[AlbertBeale]

One metro line of the west Berlin network had a section, without stopping, in the east Berlin territory.
And of course, trains from west Germany to Berlin did not stop anywhere in east Germany.
I’m not aware of any public transport line of east Germany that wandered into the west.

During the time of the division of Germany, both before and during the Berlin Wall era, there were 3 canal routes, 3 rail routes, and 3 road routes linking what became West Germany with West Berlin. The theory being, during the 4-power occupation of Germany after WW2, that since Germany as a whole, and Berlin specifically, were both divided 4-ways, and since Berlin was wholly within the Soviet zone of Germany, then there should be routes to ink each of the 3 western occupation zones of Germany to their respective zone in Berlin. (And there were 3 air corridors too.) If you look at maps of the routes, the practice wasn't as neat as that of course, for all sorts of reasons (including that the French occupation zone had no border with the Soviet zone). I'll leave out the other complications such as the parts of pre-war Germany that were detached from Germany at the end of the war and didn't count as part of these zones, and the fact that other allied countries were allowed to have their troops "in charge of" bits here and there.

As I understand it, yes, the trains from West Germany through the DDR to West Berlin didn't have station stops in East Germany, but I believe they did stop for East German guards to check them at the border at each end. On the road routes, you weren't supposed to turn off the route, but obviously it couldn't all be fenced off and guarded the whole way, and the routes couldn't be fully segregated from the rest of the East German road network. Some comrades of mine from West Germany were involved, during the Berlin Wall era, in smuggling printing equipment to comrades in East Germany, by way of driving along one of the transit routes between West Germnany and Berlin, and stopping briefly to unload crates in a pre-arranged layby... Apparently it wasn't as difficult to do such things as might have been expected- it just took organisation and nerve.

 

[duncanp]

There is also the Vennbahn, which is now in Belgium, but when it was built it was within what was then Prussian territory.

After the First World War, the land on which the rail line stood was given to Belgium, but the land on either side was in Germany.

The line is now closed to rail traffic, and has been converted, in part, to a cycleway and footpath.

Vennbahn - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The Vennbahn (German pronunciation: [ˈfɛnbaːn], "Fen Railway") is a former railway line that was built partly across what was then German territory by the Prussian state railways. It is now entirely in Belgium, because the trackbed of the line, as well as the stations and other installations, were made provisional Belgian territory in 1919 (permanent in 1922) under an article of the Treaty of Versailles.

This had the effect of creating six small exclaves of Germany on the line's western side,[1] of which five remain. The treaty (not the location of the trackbed, per se) also created one small Belgian counter-enclave, a traffic island inside a three-way German road intersection near Fringshaus.

The route is now a cycle way.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vennbahn#cite_note-2

 

[Beebman]

I’m not aware of any public transport line of east Germany that wandered into the west.

There was one which ventured very briefly into West Berlin but the situation was rather complicated and it didn't carry any local East German traffic, only transit passengers from West Germany.

The line concerned approached West Berlin from the south west via Seddin and Drewitz (now Bahnhof Medienstadt Babelsberg) where internal DR services terminated but it continued into West Berlin at Wannsee for transit passengers from West Germany on the route via Halle. Just past Drewitz the line briefly passed through an exclave of West Berlin called Steinstücken which in 1972 became connected to the main part of West Berlin by a short corridor road. This map (at https://alchetron.com/Steinstücken which has some information in English about the exclave) shows the post-1972 situation of Steinstücken:



The railway line from Drewitz passed through the main part of the exclave without stopping. After the corridor road was built this resulted in the line having a short section with West Berlin territory on either side and it passed under a road bridge with access from the north-western part of Steinstücken to the corridor (just above where it has 'Str.'). My understanding is that the bridge was in East German territory just as it passed over the railway track so road users passed very briefly into East Germany.

 

[AlbertBeale]

There was one which ventured very briefly into West Berlin but the situation was rather complicated and it didn't carry any local East German traffic, only transit passengers from West Germany.

The line concerned approached West Berlin from the south west via Seddin and Drewitz (now Bahnhof Medienstadt Babelsberg) where internal DR services terminated but it continued into West Berlin at Wannsee for transit passengers from West Germany on the route via Halle. Just past Drewitz the line briefly passed through an exclave of West Berlin called Steinstücken which in 1972 became connected to the main part of West Berlin by a short corridor road. This map (at https://alchetron.com/Steinstücken which has some information in English about the exclave) shows the post-1972 situation of Steinstücken:

View attachment 82012

The railway line from Drewitz passed through the main part of the exclave without stopping. After the corridor road was built this resulted in the line having a short section with West Berlin territory on either side and it passed under a road bridge with access from the north-western part of Steinstücken to the corridor (just above where it has 'Str.'). My understanding is that the bridge was in East German territory just as it passed over the railway track so road users passed very briefly into East Germany.

Blimey - aren't borders fun*? (And silly!)

*I probably think this because of studying topology as part of my maths degree...

 

[James James]

j
All Austria-Switzerland services have to cross Lichtenstein, and as far as I remember, none of the long-distance ones ever stops in Lichtenstein. [I did read recently of plans for a new frequent "local" service linking (I presume) Buchs (in Switzerland) and Feldkirch (in Austria), which would stop at a couple of places in Lichtenstein on the way.]

Not entirely true:
- Indeed trains from Switzerland to Austria mostly pass through Liechtenstein, without stopping - although there are a few daily OeBB operated S-Bahn trains stopping in Liechtenstein apparently (which might be increased in frequency).
- But there's also that little bit of Austria on the trainline through Bregenz (on the line from St. Gallen to Lindau), where trains can travel from Switzerland to Austria to Germany - no involvement of Liechtenstein.

(But the latter isn't an additional example for this thread: I believe all the trains from St. Gallen to Lindau stop at Bregenz.)

 

[Austriantrain]

Re "often without stopping", I think it's actually very rare for any "internal" Austrian train that uses the faster through-the-corner-of-Germany route between Salzburg and Worgl to ever serve any German stations. (Or indeed any international train through there such as Vienna-Zurich.)

No „Korridor“ Salzburg- Kufstein train via Germany has a scheduled stop there and AFAIK none ever had.

Before the Rosenheim chord was built, „Korridor“ trains had to change direction in Rosenheim station, but it wasn‘t a passenger stop. German border guards stood on the platform to make sure noone left the train.

Everything there is very relaxed nowadays but it wasn‘t always so before Austria joined the EU. However in 2015, during the height of the refugee situation, Germany briefly stopped those trains and they had to take the old route via Zell am See (lengthening the journey time by approx 2 hours). Didn‘t last long thankfully.

During Covid-lockdown, trains always could use the „Korridor“; private cars mostly could not.

 

[AlbertBeale]

Not entirely true:
- Indeed trains from Switzerland to Austria mostly pass through Liechtenstein, without stopping - although there are a few daily OeBB operated S-Bahn trains stopping in Liechtenstein apparently (which might be increased in frequency).
- But there's also that little bit of Austria on the trainline through Bregenz (on the line from St. Gallen to Lindau), where trains can travel from Switzerland to Austria to Germany - no involvement of Liechtenstein.

(But the latter isn't an additional example for this thread: I believe all the trains from St. Gallen to Lindau stop at Bregenz.)

Thanks for this. My mental map slipped - of course, there is the other line from Austria to Switzerland, from Bregenz. Though, as you say, this is really only of use for trains emanating from Germany; from anywhere else in Austria you'd be passing the Lichtenstein route before you got to Bregenz.

 

[Glenn1969]

Does rail serve Kaliningrad (the Russian enclave that I believe can only be reached from the rest of Russia by passing through Lithuania) ?

 

[RT4038]

Does rail serve Kaliningrad (the Russian enclave that I believe can only be reached from the rest of Russia by passing through Lithuania) ?

Yes, but all the through passenger trains are booked to stop in Vilnius (Lithuania) , so are not covered by the thread title. Post #56 covers.

 

[AlbertBeale]

Does rail serve Kaliningrad (the Russian enclave that I believe can only be reached from the rest of Russia by passing through Lithuania) ?

Not just Lithuania - it requires transiting at least two countries (various combinations/options exist) to get between Kaliningrad and the rest of Russia.

 

[jfollows]

Is my memory correct (or not) that what is now the Union Pacific briefly runs through Mexico to the west of El Paso?

 

[Re 4/4]

Two lines on the West Berlin U-bahn passed through/under East Berlin; during the time of the wall the stops in the East were still shown on maps but specially marked with crosses as "stations at which trains do not stop". See for example the map at https://www.transitmap.net/west-berlin-1977/.

Friedrichstrasse was indeed a special case.

The page also says

Interestingly, the S-Bahn is not represented at all on the map: it was entirely controlled by East Germany at this time, even when it ran through West Berlin. As a result, West Berliners were encouraged to boycott the S-Bahn to prevent funding the Soviet-controlled state (even though West Berlin also paid a massive annual fee to East Germany to allow U-Bahn trains to travel through the East sector).

That's half true: the other reason was that Westerners, particularly military personnel travelling alone, would occasionally "fall asleep" on the S-bahn and awake again in East German custody, where the West could trade them back again for a reasonable price, such as a captured spy. I believe the US military in fact banned all its personnel from travelling on the S-bahn for a while.