Dresden Hauptbahnhof

Railway station in Dresden, Germany

Dresden Hauptbahnhof ("main station", abbreviated Dresden Hbf) is the largest passenger station in the Saxon capital of Dresden. In 1898, it replaced the Böhmischen Bahnhof ("Bohemian station") of the former Saxon Bohemian State Railway (Sächsisch Böhmische Staatseisenbahn), and was designed with its formal layout as the central station of the city. The combination of a station building on an island between the tracks and a terminal station on two different levels is unique. The building is notable for its train sheds, which are roofed with Teflon coated glass fibre membranes. This translucent roof design, installed during the comprehensive restoration of the station at the beginning of the 21st century, allows more daylight to reach the concourses than was previously possible. The station is connected by the Dresden railway node to the tracks of the Děčín–Dresden Neustadt railway and the Dresden–Werdau railway (Saxon Franconian trunk line), allowing traffic to run to the southeast towards Prague, Vienna and on to south eastern Europe or to the southwest towards Chemnitz and Nuremberg. The connection of the routes to the north (Berlin), northwest (Leipzig) and east (Görlitz) does not take place at the station, but north of Dresden Neustadt station (at least for passenger trains).

The station is located south of the Inner Old Town in the Seevorstadt and the district of Südvorstadtat reaches its southern edge. Next door to the station area is the Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft Dresden (University of Applied Sciences). Federal highway 170 passes under the station area to the east of the station building, running north–south. Prager Straße, the inner city shopping street, begins at Wiener Platz to the north. Road traffic on Wiener Platz was diverted in the 1990s to run through a road tunnel with connections to underground parking, and it is now a pedestrianised street. Several major buildings have been constructed in the area in the modern style and there is an excavation in Wiener Platz, which was dug a few years ago, but construction has been abandoned (2013).

In 1839, the Leipzig–Dresden Railway Company (Leipzig Dresdner Eisenbahn Compagnie) opened the first long distance railway in Germany from Leipzig to its Dresden terminus, the Leipziger Bahnhof. In the following decades more railways were built, increasing the destinations that could be reached from Dresden. Each private company built its own station as the terminus of its lines. The Silesian Station (Schlesischer Bahnhof) was opened in 1847 as the terminus of the Görlitz–Dresden railway and the Bohemian station (Böhmische Bahnhof) was opened in 1848 on the line towards Bohemia. Seven years later, the Albert station (Albertbahnhof) was opened on the line towards Chemnitz and the Berliner station (Berliner Bahnhof) opened in 1875 on the line to Berlin. Between 1800 and 1900, the population of Dresden grew from 61,794 to 396,146. As a result, traffic grew enormously. The existing railway facilities proved to be inadequate to satisfy the increasing traffic as a result of rising mobility, population increase and industrialisation. In particular, the railway tracks of the poorly interconnected stations were not designed for through traffic and the many level crossings created major traffic problems. After the late 1880s, when all the railway infrastructure affecting the city had been nationalised, the Saxon government decided to carry out a fundamental reconstruction of the Dresden railway node under the leadership of the engineer Otto Klette. This would create a new central railway station, but there was no consensus on its location for a long time. After the Elbe flood of March 1845, the inspector of surveys, Karl Pressler suggested that the Weißeritz near Cotta should be relocated and that the existing riverbed could be used for a central station. This plan was taken up and the former riverbed was used for a connection line between Dresden's long distance railway stations, but, instead of a central station, the planners foresaw a new main station in front of the former Bohemian station, as it was already the busiest station in Dresden and it was close to Prager Straße, which became the most important shopping street of Dresden in the last quarter of the 19th century.

On 1 August 1848, the Saxon Bohemian State Railway (Sächsisch Böhmische Staatseisenbahn) opened the Bohemian station as the terminus of its line, which only extended to Pirna. Four long wings, which were designed by Karl Moritz Haenel and Carl Adolph Canzler in the form of Italian Renaissance buildings, were annexed. The main platform could handle two trains simultaneous at first, but it was only long. An additional long island platform was built between 1871 and 1872. This extension had become necessary because in 1869 the Bohemian station took over the passenger traffic of the Dresden–Werdau railway from the Albert Station, which was located about to the northwest and subsequently only served coal traffic. In order to handle the traffic towards Chemnitz a new main station (Hauptbahnhof) was built in front of the Bohemian station. In addition, the new Hauptbahnhof would handle the passenger traffic of the Berliner station, which was also located in the Old Town (Altstädt) on the south side of the Elbe, but almost to the northwest.

In spite of its severe war damage the station was one of the distinctive buildings in the central Dresden. The restoration of rail connections had to take precedence over the restoration of the historic building. So passenger services were restored to Bad Schandau by 17 May 1945. A temporary reconstruction began after the war and was completed in the same year. Some parts of the building, such as the concourses and the dome, were not immediately repaired and continued to deteriorate. At the same time a far reaching reorganisation of the railway infrastructure was considered as the large scale destruction of the city seemed to make it possible. Draft plans from 1946 show a turning loop south of the station, which would have allowed east–west traffic on the Chemnitz–Görlitz route to stop without a change of locomotives. In 1946 and 1947, several drafts of a new, generously dimensioned central station replacing the Wettiner Straße station emerged. The former Hauptbahnhof would have been renamed Bahnhof Dresden Prager Straße and passenger services would have operated only through the north hall and from the east side. Initially a postal station was planned for the remaining area. This was abandoned in the draft of 1947; the south hall would now also be used for passenger operations, while the central hall would be used for any purpose. It is not absolutely certain why these plans ultimately did not proceed. Possible reasons were financial problems, material shortages, labour shortages and general planning uncertainty during a period of social and political changes. A planned new entrance building on Wiener Platz with an attached new administration building for the Reichsbahndirektion Railway division of Dresden was also not realised. The remaining structure was restored from 1950 in a similar but simpler form, due to economic difficulties and the shortage of skilled workers. The roof, which had previously been partially covered with glass, was temporarily covered with wood, board and slate. The station building itself was only partially restored. In particular, the buildings south of the main hall remained hollow ruins, although the outer walls implied a complete reconstruction. The intact steel construction of the dome over the main hall was also externally covered with wood and slate and a coffered ceiling was built inside it. The construction work was not largely completed until the early 1960s. One of the last measures was the modification of the clock towers on either side of the entrance portal to fit the “skeletal” facade. In the coming decades, the station's makeshift parking and traffic arrangements and its power lines shaped perceptions of it.

From the 1960s the station again became an important hub for long distance services from Western Europe and Scandinavia to Southeastern Europe. The well known services of this period were the Vindobona (Berlin–Vienna), the Hungaria (Berlin–Budapest) and the Meridian (Malmö–Bar). As part of the change in traction, trains hauled by electric locomotives reached Dresden from Freiberg for the first time in September 1966. A good ten years later–on 24 September 1977–the final steam hauled service departed the station towards Berlin as the Dresden Express. In the following days, peaceful demonstrations took place in Lenin Platz and the adjacent Prager Straße, resulting in the beginning of a dialogue on state power at the local level with the establishment of the Group of 20 (Gruppe der 20) on the evening 8 October. With a combined 156 arrivals and departures of scheduled long distance trains per day in the station in the summer 1989 timetable, it was the third most important node in the network of Deutsche Reichsbahn, after Berlin and Leipzig.

Since the 1990s, Dresden has gradually become part of the Intercity network. From 1991, individual Intercity services ran via Leipzig and the Thuringian Railway to Frankfurt am Main and these service have run every two hours since 1992. The first pair of EuroCity services ran from Dresden to Paris Est over the same route on 2 June 1991. That same year, InterRegio trains served Dresden for the first time. The 2048/2049 and 2044/2143 trains pairs ran between Cologne and Dresden. Until the timetable change on 28 May 2000, a pair of trains ICE ran daily via Berlin to Dresden, then the hourly ICE line 50 service, which has continued to the present, was introduced from Dresden to Frankfurt via Leipzig, eliminating the connection via Berlin. Dresden station became the starting point of the central east–west connection in the German ICE network. This change caused changes in locomotive hauled long distance operations, since Dresden was now served almost exclusively in the north–south direction by Intercity (IC) and EuroCity (EC) trains. There were other related changes to the IC/EC network. So already the service, subsequently numbered EC/IC 27 (Prague–Dresden–Berlin), received a through connection to Hamburg in 1994 and in 2003 two pairs of trains continued to Vienna and a pair of trains continued to Aarhus in Denmark for the first time. ICE TD (class 605) services ran on the Saxon Franconian trunk line to Nuremberg from 10 June 2001. These replaced InterRegio services that had been abandoned a year earlier. After the 2002 Elbe flood and the resulting disruption of the line between Chemnitz and Dresden, as well as problems with the tilting systems, Deutsche Bahn discontinued the operation of the trainsets from the summer of 2003. Instead services were operated with Intercity trains until the end of long distance services in 2006. A suitcase bomb was discovered in the station by an explosive detection dog on 6 June 2003. After the evacuation of the entire building, the police destroyed the suitcase bomb. The bomb consisted of a standard wheeled suitcase which contained an alarm clock, a pressure cooker, explosives and stones as well as an ignition device with fuse. According to experts, this bomb was capable of exploding.

The first restoration work took place in the 1990s. The bridges over federal highway 170 were renovated and the eastern building was given a new facade on the street side and new entrance steps. A draft plan by Gerkan, Marg and Partners for the modernisation of the station in the mid 1990s envisaged part of the central hall remodelled as a market as well as the building of an office and hotel tower. This design was not realised. At the end of December 2000, the Board of Deutsche Bahn, let a contract for modernisation work. The planned construction costs amounted to approximately DM 100 million, which was funded from the federal government's remediation funds, Deutsche Bahn's own funds and a grant from the state of Saxony (DM 13 million). The completion of construction works was scheduled for the spring of 2003. The extensive redevelopment had already commenced in 2000 with the commissioning of the Leipzig remote electronic control centre. The additional redevelopment included the renovation of the entrance building and the train shed roof, track work of the north and south hall and changes to the track and signaling systems. To ensure uninterrupted movement of trains, the track structures of the north hall were first rehabilitated and recommissioned in November 2003. Subsequently, the renovation of the track structures of the south hall began at the end of 2004. The train shed roof was renovated from 2002 and the station building was renovated from the end of 2003. Because of the construction, shops were accommodated in containers in the station hall from 2002 to 2006. The dome above the connection hall between the two halls, which is up to high, the connecting hall and the large waiting rooms were restored to their historical designs. A travel centre and a supermarket were opened in the waiting rooms in July 2006, simultaneously with the commissioning of the central hall. The high level platforms are now reached via escalators and lifts. In December 2007, the newly designed network of tracks was put into operation on the station's south side, except for platform 1, which was opened at the end of 2008. In addition, the two freight train tracks outside the south hall were rebuilt, but omitting the platform between the tracks that had been built with the tracks in about 1930. The 2002 floods delayed the renovation work significantly. On 12 August 2002, the station was closed due to flooding by the Weißeritz, which had returned to its old route through Dresden and followed the route of the line to Chemnitz to reach the Hauptbahnhof, reaching a height of up to at the station. Water, mud and debris caused damage of €42 million. Many sections of track were impassable for a long time, especially towards Chemnitz. After a few regional trains reached the station on 2 September 2002, a long distance train also reached it. It was carried out in 2006 to coincide with the celebration of the 800 year anniversary of the city. The opening meant the end of a significant obstacle for tourism, but the renovations have not yet finished even in 2014. After 20 months of construction, carried out as part of the federal economic stimulus package, the refurbishment of the station's energy systems were completed in June 2011. This construction work included the renovation of the royal pavilion. Since the summer of 2011, Deutsche Bahn has been developing a future retail space under the tracks of the north and south hall of the station. Around €25 million were expected to be invested by 2014. It has around 40 storefronts with a total area of The first new stores opened in August 2013, although construction work had not been completed in April 2014. However, this construction phase was not included in the 2011–2015 federal Investment Framework Plan (Investitionsrahmenplan) and construction is not currently scheduled (as of 2012). In September 2013, Deutsche Bahn said that the platforms of the central hall would be replaced by 2019 and they would also be slightly raised. The Förderverein Dresdner Hauptbahnhof e. V. (Friends of Dresden Hauptbahnhof) supported the renovation and enabled the recovery of some details about the required conservation measures. So broken decorative elements on a sandstone facade of the clock tower were returned to their correct places, windows were equipped with arches and architraves and the crowning group statue of Saxonia with personifications of science and technology have been restored.

A special feature of the station is the renovated roof, which was designed by the British architect Sir Norman Foster. The previous panes of framed glass were replaced by thick glass fibre membranes which have been stretched between the arched halls. The membranes have double sided Teflon coatings that are thick and are self cleaning. It was the first time that a historic building had been treated with this new material. Designed for a service life of 50 years, the membrane can resist tensile forces of up to about 150 kN per metre. It can be walked over by trained personnel with a safety harness. The membrane is largely translucent during the daytime and reflects the light of the concourse back at night; the structure appears to be silver from the outside. Narrow slits between the membranes are left open over the hall arches, forming a total of 67 skylights. The roof area is about (of which is composed of glass fibre membrane), which covers a surface area about The architects who won the competition emphasised their entry's relatively easy installation, low weight and low maintenance costs (self cleaning). According to the Deutsche Bahn specifications, cooling is not required due to the "tent construction" of the roof even in bright sunlight. The restoration was carried out between February 2001 and July 2006 with trains running through the station. of material were installed in the two outer halls from elevated work platforms and more than of material were installed in the central hall. On 15 May 2001, workers began with the removal of the old glass roof. Some of the old steel beams were rebuilt and some new ones have been inserted as wind bracing between the hall arches. Secondary structures were then built to attach the membranes on the beams. A total of more than 100,000 screws were installed, some of which also replaced rivets on the historic hall arches. A service lift was also installed. The planning began in 1997 and originally a full canopy covering the outer platforms was envisaged, but this was rejected in 2000. Instead it was decided to take up an option to extend the two outer roofs by to the east above the outer platforms using a membrane roof. The membrane roof has been damaged several times during bad weather. In the winter of 2010/2011, eight cracks, which were up to wide, were formed. Responsibility for the damage was still being contested in court in January 2013.

The main entrance of the station building forms part of a large circular portal window arch. The portal is installed in the massive Avant corps that dominates the centre of the facade. In addition there is a statue of Saxonia, the embodiment of the spirit of Saxony, which is arranged between allegories of science and technology. Both the portal of the entrance building and the clock towers on both sides show the association of the station with the architectural style of Historicism, which was typical of the buildings of the kingdom of Saxony in Dresden. The entrance building consists of two elongated, T shaped crossings, which intersect under the large glass dome of the hall. The main corridor leads to the central hall, while the side halls can be reached by passages running parallel to the cross passage through the central hall. During the renovation of the business and administrative areas, large parts of the station building were converted into facades and additional areas of glass were inserted into its roofs for daylighting. While the interiors of the lobby are now simply decorated, they appeared much more lively before the destruction of the station during World War II. Ceiling paintings and the 26 emblems of the administrative districts of the Kingdom of Saxony in their heraldic colours adorned the lobby. The waiting rooms of the first and second class were graced with large murals made of porcelain tiles to the design of Prof. Julius Storm of Meissen. For a long time many locals have met at the Unterm Strick (“rope end"), which is just below the center of the dome of Dresden station. Before the renovation of the station, a so called rope hung here in the middle of the entrance hall. Although nothing has hung here since the station redevelopment, the old name is still used for this meeting place by many in Dresden. At this point of the roof, there is now a round cushion, in diameter and made of ETFE foil. Its height can be adjusted and it serves mainly to regulate the ventilation. In the upper floor of the station there has been a DB Lounge for first class passengers and frequent travellers since September 2006. In the entrance building there are shops for travel needs. It includes leased retail space of in addition to the space below the elevated tracks of the south hall; this provision is low compared to other metropolitan stations.

As an important transport hub in Dresden, the station is linked to various transport services. It is not only a stop on the rail network, but it is also an important transfer point for public transport, a grade separated crossing of two main roads and the beginning of the pedestrianised route through the inner city.

Each day the station is used by around 60,000 passengers, 381 trains (including 50 long distance services), including up to ten S Bahn services each hour. In passenger traffic it is served by services operated by DB Fernverkehr (long distance), DB Regio (Nordost and Südost), and Vogtlandbahn (under the brand name of Trilex). In addition, about 200 freight trains operated by different railway companies pass the station daily. The most common direct destination outside the area of the Dresden S Bahn is Leipzig with up to 32 services daily. The other most frequent long distance destinations are Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Wiesbaden, Prague and Budapest. The Saxon Franconian trunk line via Chemnitz and the Vogtland to Nuremberg has been discontinued in recent years, despite the growth of long distance traffic and is now only operated by DB Regio as far as Hof. The number of direct connections to the station mean that it has national significance as an interchange. It is one of the 21 stations of the highest category as classified by DB Station&Service.

The station is the main inner city hub for national passenger services. From the outset, it was the centre of the tram network of the Dresdner Verkehrsbetriebe (Dresden Transport) or its predecessor organisations. Today, along with Postplatz, Albertplatz and Pirnaischer Platz, it is one of the four major tram hubs of the city. The first bus service was operated in Dresden from April 1914 via the station as the overland buses of the Kraftverkehrsgesellschaft Freistaat Sachsen (KVG) from 1919 until the end of World War II. Tram stops are located on the station forecourt fronting highway B170 and on Wiener Platz. The distance from the centre of the station to each of the tram stops is about The connecting path runs at ground level from the head of the platforms. Also in front of the entrance building is the bus stop, which is served by city and regional buses. As part of further restructuring, a new central bus station (Zentraler Omnibus Bahnhof, ZOB) is being built at the western end of Wiener Platz. Bus passengers will then be able to use the station entrance by the royal pavilion. Four tram lines (3, 7, 8, 10), a city bus route (66) and several regional bus services operated by Regionalverkehr Dresden (Regional Transport Dresden), line 261 operated by the Pirna Sebnitz Upper Elbe Transport Company (Oberelbischen Verkehrsgesellschaft Pirna Sebnitz) and other services operated by long distance transport companies regularly stop at the station. Apart from destinations in the surrounding area of Dresden, services are also operated to Annaberg Buchholz, Olbernhau and Mittweida as well as Teplice in the Czech Republic, among other places. In addition, tram lines 9 and 11 stop at the Hauptbahnhof Nord stop, which is about to the northeast of the station. In the Bayerischen Straße to the south of the station are the bus stops of several long distance bus services. After the completion of the planned ZOB, this is to be served by all regional and long distance bus services.

Stopping places for cars are provided near the entrances on the south side of the station. An underground car park with 350 parking spaces is located at Wiener Platz in front of the northern entrances of the station. It is reached from the road tunnel under the Platz running to the east. Further parking is available in parking garages and parking lots along Prager Straße and south of the station.

The renovated station in Dresden received the 2007 Renault Traffic Future Award for special transport architecture. In addition, the architectural firm of Foster and Partners received a second place in the award of the Stirling Prize in the same year and in 2008 the new roof of the station hall received the Brunel Award, an award for railway design. In August 2014, the station was given an award by Allianz pro Schiene entitled "Station of the Year in the category of large city railway station". The jury praised the station as being a "monument of a clear, lilting lightness."