65,000 protest demolition of Stuttgart RR station

-in what has to be the greatest rail preservation rally of all time, an estimated 65,000 people turned out in the streets of Stuttgart, Germany to protest demolition of the landmark railroad station. Deutsche Bahn is tearing off the wings of the 1930's station to provide new through underground routes into downtown Stuttgart. Charges were made that the state government had poorly represented the interests of the people, and that Deutsche Bahn's "Project 21" would end up with massive cost overruns. There were demands that the modernization project be halted, and the demolished sections be rebuilt.

Roger Wines

Hello,


the Protest are a little bit late.............because the Legislature for that had passed long time before.........

Doesn't really matter. 75% chance we'll have a different state government here in Baden-Württemberg over this come next spring - which can easily still stop S21. According to surveys, 80% of people think S21 will play a major role in the state parliament election scheduled for next March. Current surveys project an SPD/Greens coalition government under a Green (!) minister president (who rabidly oppose the project).

More power to the protesters. This project is uncharacteristically (for Germany) pork-laden and way too expensive, never mind being forced down everyone's throat solely for political reasons. They did get the government to the table; lots of negative press with the Polizei using water cannons and pepper spray.

Considering the election results for Baden-Wuerttemberg in March, 2011, will Stuttgart 21 come to a halt, or will any improvement be made to speed up the service from Stuttgart to other cities? I was under the impression that one objective of Stuttgart 21 was the elimination of the stub-end terminal.
Thanks.

DB has suspended most work on S21 following the election.

Currently a "stress test" is being performed, which examines whether S21 will be able to perform at 130% of the capacity of the current head terminal. This will be finished by June this year. It's likely S21 will fail this, which will open certain legal options to the new government; for example cancelling the contracts. An alternative legal way is that the government has the supreme court examine whether it is legal for the state to fund S21 in the first place (since this is technically a federal issue, not a state issue). These two options are pretty much the only ones in which the state can bail out without paying ungodly sums.

As for improvements, the federal transport minister has already announced that the Wendlingen - Ulm highspeed rail line - that is currently part of the S21 package - will be built in any case. There are alternative options for the S21 train station(s); among them the most likely is simply improving the current stub-end terminal. The primary source of slow traffic around Stuttgart isn't so much the terminal, but instead the routes leading up to it within city limits, in particular from the north.

hello,

not really.......Contracts are made and there will be still the Building of S21........all other is still cosmetique .....

The contracts are only for part of the construction though; current projects within Stuttgart that are part of S21 are:

• reordering the tracks at Stuttgart main station in order to move the platforms 120m away from the station (needed to dig the hole for the underground station) - continuing due to heavy operational interlock with train timetable
• building of a water pump system to pump ground water out of the holes dug as part of S21 during construction - suspended, needs 16 km of pipes to be laid still
• moving underground pipes and cables under the parking lot north of the station to the side in order to dig the hole for an underground technical supply station - suspended, only partially begun

DB will not tender out any new contracts. This in particular affects the contract for the main tunnel from S21 to the future airport station, worth several hundred million. The bidding for this contract has not been concluded yet, and DB has suspended the tendering process. The other tunnels, as well as the construction of the two stations themselves, have not entered the bidding process so far.

Hello,


no no........
Stuutgart21 will be come.........as Chairman Volker Kefer from Deutsche Bahn AG said:

Der Vertrag mit dem Land gelte "uneingeschränkt".....

(The Contract between German Railways and the Country ist full in progress)

Money over Milliards of € is in the Playground.......everyone who thougt,that a Goverment would keep this in the sand believes in Magic......

Also that the most People didn`t want to pay the price for the Citizens of Stuttgart in that high.......

CrossingJake wrote:Der Vertrag mit dem Land gelte "uneingeschränkt".....

To paraphrase a German proverb, DB will talk a lot if the day is long...

The fact that DB isn't tendering out new contracts is a fact. Of course that doesn't only have to do with the election - the construction companies are extremely cautious in bidding, there's rumours DB couldn't find anyone for the Fildertunnel part of the project. That part, due to its size and worth of several hundred million € effectively only has a couple companies that could place a reliable bid on it in the first place (e.g. BilfingerBerger), and precisely those companies are refraining from bidding due to the unsecure future of the project.

Germans Back Giant Rail Station to End Fierce Battle - NYTimes.com

Germans in a southwestern state voted Sunday in favour of building a 4.5-billion euro train station in Stuttgart, ending a controversy over the giant project that helped to push Chancellor Angela Merkel's party out of power in the state.

Voters in Baden-Wuerttemberg backed by a 59-41 percent margin the "Stuttgart 21" station that will be part of a high-speed rail network linking southern Germany, France and Austria. About 48 percent of eligible state voters took part in the referendum, a rarity in Germany.

Stuttgart 21 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The existing station is a stub-end one with 17 tracks, and the new station will have 8 tracks, and be in a tunnel perpendicular to the the existing tracks.

Technically we voted against allowing the state to rescind its (illegally contributed) 900 million Euro share from the project.