Everything about The Schwebebahn Wuppertal totally explained
The
Schwebebahn Wuppertal is a suspension railway in
Wuppertal,
Germany. Its full name is the “Eugen Langen Monorail Suspension Railway” (
Einschienige Hängebahn System Eugen Langen). The people of Wuppertal know it, however, as the “Old Lady” ("Alte Dame") or the “Steel
Dragon” (“Der stählerne Drache”). Designed by
Eugen Langen, who originally planned to build it in
Berlin, it was built in
1900, opened in
1901 and is still in use today as a local transport system in the city. It is the oldest monorail system in the world.
The suspension railway travels along a route 13.3 kilometres long, about 12 metres above the surface of the river
Wupper between Oberbarmen and Sonnborner Straße (10 km) and approximately 8 m above the city streets, between Sonnborner Straße and Vohwinkel
The supporting frame and tracks are made out of 486 pillars and bridgework sections. At the ends of the route there are turning points Subsequently, a safety device was developed to make derailments nearly impossible.
A circus made a publicity stunt on this day by putting an elephant named
Tuffi on the train at Alter Markt. Tuffi became disturbed shortly after the ride began and crashed through the left side of the car and fell into the river below. The elephant, two journalists, and one passenger received minor injuries. Both the WSW and the circus director were fined in the incident. To this day, the location of the incident, between the stations Alter Markt and Adlerbrücke, is marked with a painted elephant on a house wall.
11 September 1968
On this day, a truck crashed into a pillar and caused to section of track to fall. There were no trains in the area at the time. This incident led to the use of concrete walls in pillar anchors.
25 March 1997
A technical malfunction caused a rear-end collision in Oberbarmen station between a structure train and the Kaiserwagen. There were 14 injuries, but no derailment.
12 April 1999
The only fatal accident on the Schwebebahn Wuppertal occurred during construction work on the Robert-Daum-Platz station. Workers forgot to remove a metal claw from the track and the first train of the morning crashed down into the river. There were 5 deaths and 47 injuries.
In Literature
The Schwebebahn is alluded to in
Theodore Herzl's utopian novel
Altneuland. (
The Old New Land) For Herzl, the Schwebebahn was the ideal form of urban transport, and he imagined a large monorail built in its style in
Haifa.
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In Film
Rudiger Vogeler and Yella Rottlander take The Schwebebahn in
Wim Wenders’ 1974 movie
Alice in den Städten(Alice in the cities). It also appears in
Tom Tykwer’s 2000 film
Der Krieger und die Kaiserin (The Princess and the Warrior).
The Schwebebahn provides both subject matter and title to a video work by the
Turner Prize-nominated artist
Darren Almond. Produced in 1995,
Schwebebahn is the first of three videos that constitute his Train Trilogy.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Schwebebahn Wuppertal'.
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