The station lies in the north of the town. Whilst this simplified its accessibility from Halberstadt to the north, it made a railway route into the Harz Mountains very costly.
History
Share of the Halberstadt-Blankenburger Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, issued 1. May 1870
Blankenburg station was opened on 31 March 1873 by the Halberstadt-Blankenburg Railway Company (Halberstadt-Blankenburger Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft or HBE). In its early years trains only ran to the station from Halberstadt. The main purpose of the line was to provide a connexion for the Blankenburg smelting works to the railway network.
On 3 July 1875 a 3.5 kilometre long line from Blankenburg station to the smelting works in the west of the town was completed. It was known as the Erzstufen Railway and was a cog railway using the Abt rack system. It was the oldest industrial siding in the Harz. But it was closed again in 1885 because, from 1880, the Blankenburg–Tanne line, also built by the HBE, provided a better link to the factory. For topographical reasons the line had to leave Blankenburg station in a northwesterly direction, thus resulting in a railway terminus. This line became the Harz Railway (Harzbahn) and since 1950 has been called the Rübeland Railway (Rübelandbahn).
From 1960 to 1965 the Rübeland Railway was electrified. Its electrification system is different from the normal systems. Because this line is isolated from the rest of the electrified railway network, a variation optimised for the railway was able to be chosen. For a long time, however, this required the employment of special locomotives of Class E 251, later the Class 171, that were maintained at the depot near the station in Blankenburg.
After the sections of the Rübeland Railway to Tanne and Königshütte were closed, in 2005 passenger services on the rest of the line to Elbingerode were ceased.
As well as Blankenburg station, that is mainly used for passenger services, Blankenburg also has a goods station and the North station, both responsible for marshalling trains for the Rübeland Railway.
The Harz Narrow Gauge Railways is a railway company that operates a 1,000 mmmetre gauge network in the Harz mountains, in central Germany. The company was formed after the Second World War as a merger of two earlier companies. It owns about 140 kilometres of track, connecting the principal towns of Wernigerode, Nordhausen and Quedlinburg and several smaller settlements in the area. Much of the network is steeply graded and picturesque, but its most popular destination is the Brocken, the highest mountain in the region. The company runs a significant number of its trains with steam haulage, mostly employing 1950s vintage 2-10-2 tank locomotives, hauling traditional open-platform bogie carriages. The company is mainly owned by the various local authorities whose territories it serves.
Blankenburg (Harz) is a town and health resort in the district of Harz, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany, at the north foot of the Harz Mountains, 12 miles (19 km) southwest of Halberstadt.
Elbingerode is an Ortsteil of Oberharz am Brocken in the Harz district, in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. The former town was incorporated into the newly established municipality on 1 January 2010.
The Harz Railway or Trans-Harz Railway was formerly the main line of the Harz Narrow Gauge Railways and runs north to south right across the Harz Mountains from Wernigerode to Nordhausen. However, the tourist attraction of the Brocken, the highest mountain in the Harz, is so great that the Brocken Railway is effectively the main line today. The Trans-Harz Railway joins up with the Selke Valley Railway to Quedlinburg at Eisfelder Talmühle where all trains are organised to make good connections.
The South Harz Railway Company or SHE was founded in 1897 and, on 15 August 1899, opened a 24 km long, winding and hilly, metre gauge railway from Walkenried via Wieda and Brunnenbachsmühle to Braunlage in the Harz Mountains of central Germany. On 1 November 1899 a 3 km extension for goods trains was opened to the Wurmberg mountain.
The Rübeland Railway is a railway link from Blankenburg via Rübeland and Königshütte to Tanne in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It was built by the Halberstadt-Blankenburg railway (HBE) between 1880 and 1886. The route length is 30.6 kilometres, the height difference over 300 metres. The seven kilometre long section from Königshütte to Tanne was closed in 1968 and the five kilometres from Elbingerode to Königshütte followed suit on 30 August 2000, the last train to Königshütte having run in 1999.
Königshütte is a German village in the district of Harz, in the state of Saxony-Anhalt. Since 1 January 2010 is a part of the municipality of Oberharz am Brocken.
The East German electric locomotives of DR Class E 251(from 1970: 251, DBAG Class 171) were not standard engines either within the Deutsche Reichsbahn's or subsequently the Deutsche Bahn's fleet, due to the different specification of their electrical system. They were only used on the Blankenburg (Harz) – Königshütte line. Because this line had steep inclines, but connecting this isolated branch to the main traction network would have been very expensive, the Deutsche Reichsbahn electrified it in 1965 with a 25 kV 50 Hz system, which was different from the usual German catenary supply of 15 kV 16⅔ Hz. The 15 Co’Co’ engines were supplied by LEW and registered with the Reichsbahn as E 251 001 to 015.
The Neuekrug-Hahausen–Goslar railway is a double-tracked, non-electrified main line in Lower Saxony in central Germany. The line, which runs along the northern edge of the Harz mountains, begins in Goslar and forms a junction with the Brunswick–Kreiensen railway to Seesen and Kreiensen at Neuekrug-Hahausen. Because the branch-off station is passed through nowadays without stopping, it is often called the Goslar–Seesen railway. It is often described in the local area as the North Harz Line (Nordharzstrecke) but the term may cause confusion. The most important, and now the only, intermediate station is Langelsheim.
The Halle–Hann. Münden railway is a 218 km long main line operated by the Deutsche Bahn in Germany, which links Halle (Saale) in Saxony-Anhalt with Hann. Münden in the state of Lower Saxony. It is mainly used by regional and east-west goods trains. From 1990 to 1994 it was upgraded as part of a German Unification Transport Project.
The Magdeburg–Thale railway is a predominantly single-track, non-electrified main line railway that connects Thale, in the northern Harz, with Magdeburg, the capital of Saxony-Anhalt. Its eastern section between Magdeburg and Halberstadt was opened in 1843 and it is one of the oldest railways in Germany.
The Halle–Vienenburg railway is a 123 kilometre long non-electrified main line north of the Harz Mountains in central Germany. It is an important connection between the metropolitan area of Halle (Saale) and the northern Harz mountains. It was opened in several sections between 1862 and 1872 by the Magdeburg–Halberstadt Railway Company and is now maintained by DB Netz except for the disused section between Heudeber-Danstedt and Vienenburg. Since 1996, traffic between Heudeber-Danstedt and Vienenburg has used the railway via Wernigerode running further to the south.
The present-day Heudeber-Danstedt–Vienenburg railway is a 32 kilometre long main line, that serves the northern edge of the Harz Mountains in central Germany. Its main role is the handling of tourist traffic in the Harz and the Harz Narrow Gauge Railways there, but it is also worked by goods trains to and from the rolling mills in Ilsenburg.
The Bielstein Tunnel is a disused railway tunnel in Saxony-Anhalt in the Harz Mountains of Central Germany. The tunnel is 465.7 metres long and lies between the zig zag of Michaelstein and Braunesumpf. It belonged to the Erzstufen Railway and, from 1885, to the Harz Railway . During the construction of the Harz Railway the tunnel profile was widened and Braunesumpf station laid out. When the Rübeland Railway was electrified from 1960 to 1965 the tunnel profile had to be widened again. In addition the tunnel was found to be in poor condition so that it was abandoned and the line was relaid further east through a cutting. The tunnel is no longer accessible today.
The Frose–Quedlinburg railway, also called the Balkan ("Balkans") locally, was a standard gauge branch line on the northern rim of the Harz Mountains in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. The line runs from Frose via Gernrode to Quedlinburg. It was closed in 2004. The Gernrode–Quedlinburg section was subsequently converted by the Harz Narrow Gauge Railway Company to metre gauge. Since 26 June 2006 the line has been re-opened as part of the Selke Valley Railway.
Transdev Sachsen-Anhalt is a regional railway company, a subsidiary of Transdev Germany. It provided passenger services on the North Harz network from 2005 to 2018 under the name HEX (HarzElbeExpress).
Thale Hauptbahnhof is a station on the Magdeburg–Thale railway in the town of Thale in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. The station is classified by Deutsche Bahn as a category 5 station. The only other station in Thale is the stop at Thale Musestieg, although there used to be three stations in Thale on a branch of the Blankenburg–Quedlinburg railway, which was opened in 1908 and was closed in the 1960s.
The Hildesheim–Goslar railway is a 53 kilometre long, double-track and non-electrified main line in the northern Harz foothills in the German state of Lower Saxony. It serves mainly to connect with the tourist region in the northern Harz with Hildesheim and Hanover. It is served by the HarzExpress, running between Halle, Halberstadt, Goslar and Hannover Hauptbahnhof. The most important station and junction of the line is Salzgitter-Ringelheim station.
Quedlinburg station is a station on the Magdeburg–Thale railway in Quedlinburg in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It was built in 1862 as a through station on the southern edge of the town. The Gothic Revival entrance building of 1862, together with the other parts of the nearly complete Gründerzeit ensemble, is heritage-protected.
The Halberstadt–Blankenburg railway is a non-electrified, single-track railway line, from Halberstadt via Langenstein and Börnecke to Blankenburg in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. The Rübeland Railway connects to the line at Blankenburg (Harz) station. Until 1968, there was a branch to Derenburg. The branch line originally ran to Minsleben.
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