The railroad weakness came with breast milk

Created: 10/25/2022, 2:05 p.m

For 105 years, the Walpertskirchen train station on the railway embankment shaped the townscape.

On the snowless January 10, 1976, the railway buildings await demolition, which took place three months later.

© Photo: Karl Bürger

Karl Bürger, the railway activist from Walpertskirchen, tells a little about his life, but above all how his passion for the railway came about. 

District - Karls Bürger writes books in which the railway takes up a lot of space, but which not only contain data, facts, pictures, plans and tables, but above all also take a side look at the living conditions of the people and the circumstances of the respective periods of time, what make the books so entertaining.

And without his commitment, Walpertskirchen would no longer have a train station today.

"The passion for the railway came with mother's milk," smiles Karl Bürger.

"Then the event happened in 1966 - I had just turned 10, which established my more than 40 years of transport policy commitment: In July 1966, the Walpertskirchen train station was razed." Simbach.

Splendor, decline and renaissance of a royal Bavarian railway eventful transport history with a revolutionary future": "...Whenever possible, he [citizen, born 1956] watched the trains on the nearby Munich - Mühldorf railway line, in front of which brand-new red diesel engines hummed, but black monsters hissed as well, dragging long lines of brown goods wagons and (rather less frequently) stomping along in front of the green and modern silver passenger cars.

The boy forgot the world, the hard-working locomotives appeared on the railway embankment, roaring staccato, roaring staccato, their mighty clouds of steam only dissipating after the last car had rumbled past.

What beautiful scenes!

And everyone had to remain unphotographed for lack of a camera..."

What the dismantling crew then did in 1966 “had followed the ten-year-old with sadness every day.

He watched with emotion as the interlocking and signals were torn down, and when the big rail crane finally ripped out the points and the overtaking and siding track, he (of which he was still ashamed) could no longer hold back the 'Wasserburger'.

Now the stately station building stood deserted and lost away from the continuous main track.

The striking brick building, which, together with the goods hall, largely characterized the townscape, was still largely in the condition in which it had been built in 1870/71.” When the Munich Federal Railway Directorate intended to completely close the Walpertskirchen stop, Bürger began to resist to organize.

"Otherwise," says the railroad activist,

"The 2200 inhabitants of Walpertskirchen lost this extremely valuable infrastructure facility forever.

The fight was successful.

Since 2002, the station has been served every two hours, seven days a week, outside of rush hour.

Until 1993, the train service was only halfway usable for commuter traffic, but completely unusable for other activities.

And that was on purpose to reduce passenger numbers and justify the closure.

In this way, the railway has shut down countless stations - it's all in my new book 'Blickpunkte am Eisenbahnbahn.

How the railways became what they are', which is very much in demand for that very reason. 

This perfidious system is also the subject of my play 'Der Rebell von Pertskirchen', which will be performed on November 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th in the multi-purpose hall in Walpertskirchen.

The play also deals with the aloofness and greed of corporations, where 'normal people' as customers are only a nuisance, and also with the top-down attitude and self-importance of authorities and large companies bristling with market power.

The piece celebrating the 150th anniversary of the Walpertskirchen railway station includes five elevators with nine singing interludes, whereby the 'railway packaging' is just one example of the above, but it also plays into the fact that the railway is indispensable as a service of general interest - even if it has been like this for decades seems as if this is no longer an issue in politics and in society.

On the four performance days, an exhibition created by Bürger will also be shown in the multi-purpose hall.

at

150 years of railway market Swabia - Erding

On November 16, a special exhibition “150 years of railway market Swabia - Erding” starts in the Museum Erding.

There is a freshly printed 56-page brochure "Erding Railway History".

The booklet in DINA 4 format costs 15 euros and can be ordered from the author Karls Bürger at karl-buerger@t-online.

de or by telephone on (0 81 22) 35 97, as well as his new book, 303 pages and 655 large-format pictures, most of which have not yet been published: Format DINA 4 for 39.90 euros.