Alpine railways to Ampass
to Innsbruck to Ahrental to Wolf St Jodok emergency station
to Munich Innsbruck bypass Innsbruck emergency station
Trens emergency station to Mauls to Verona Brenner base tunnel
ÖBB Railjet services that do not stop at Jenbach, will continue to use the existing line. The diversion of most freight traffic will allow the introduction of higher-frequency, regular-interval regional services. In addition, plans are already in place to quadruple the line northeast of Kundl, and this will run in a tunnel from Kundl to Schaftenau, southwest of Kufstein. An agreement has also been reached on the cross-border section, which will continue the line north into Bavaria to rejoin the Kufstein - Munich line to Brannenburg. However, these sections will only be built following the completion of the Brenner base tunnel.
Rebuilding The Brenner line running south from
Innsbruck to Brennero in Italy is a steeply-graded mountain railway with high levels of freight traffic. Over the years the quality of the track has deteriorated and upgrading became neccessary. It would have been possible to repair the line over a five-year period with temporary single line working, but this solution would have been costly and reduced capacity for long periods. ÖBB therefore opted for a series of weekend closures from June onwards, followed by a six-week blockade from the beginning of August until mid- September. This will allow ÖBB to complete the rebuilding of the Brenner line by the time the new Kundl - Baumkirchen line opens.
During the periods of total closure freight trains were diverted through
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Switzerland via the Gotthard line or via Salzburg, Villach, and Tarvisio. Rolling Road and regional passenger services were suspended, while Munich - Verona Eurocity services were replaced by buses between Innsbruck and Brennero. The lack of road access made
reconstruction work extremely difficult, and most materials had to be delivered by rail. This necessitated total closure because one track was required for engineering trains while the other was being relaid.
While this work will make the line fit for purpose once more, it does not overcome the fundamental capacity issues currently faced by both the railway and the parallel Brenner motorway, which can only be fully addressed by new infrastructure. The first studies for the Brenner base tunnel were carried out in 1989, and in 1994 the EU added the Brenner corridor to its list of priority transport projects. In 1999 a joint company for planning the base tunnel was founded by Austria and Italy, and after many years of planning, the base tunnel was finally approved in 2009.
The 55km-long tunnel will have two
bores starting south of Innsbruck and emerging south of Fortezza in Italy. The severity of the gradients on the existing line means freight trains require up to three locomotives for the climb from Innsbruck to Brennero. There are agreements between Germany, Austria and Italy for building the tunnel and increasing capacity on the approach lines, and the tunnel itself is being built by a company owned jointly by Italy
The steep gradients of the existing Brenner line call for banking and piloting of most freight trains. Photo: Erwin Reidinger
and Austria, which is registered as Galleria di Base del Brennero/Brenner Basistunnel. The tunnel reaches its summit of 790m beneath the Brenner Pass, which reaches a height of 1371m. The maximum gradient is .67%, compared with 2.5% on the existing line. South of Innsbruck there will be an underground junction linking the line with the Innsbruck bypass. The whole tunnel will be operated in left hand running, as is the case in Italy, and trains will switch from left to right-hand running either at Innsbruck station or on the link to the Innsbruck bypass. The line will be electrified at 25kV/50Hz, switching to the Austrian 15kV/16.7Hz system south of Innsbruck.
Initial tunnelling works are focused on an exploratory bore between the two running tunnels, which will act as a service tunnel with cross passages situated at intervals of 333m. The tunnel will have three emergency stations,
IRJ October 2012
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