Ludwigsfelde station

After the station had only local significance for several decades, traffic levels increased significantly in the 1930s. With the opening of the Daimler-Benz car factory in Genshagen, Ludwigsfelde became an important industrial centre and the number of inhabitants multiplied. Genshagener Heide station was first built on the Michendorf–Großbeeren railway for factory workers, but later a new Birkengrund station was built on the Anhalt Railway. During working hours, the trains were stored at Ludwigsfelde station. A staff station for the car factory was built in the Birkengrund area north of Ludwigsfelde station.

It was originally planned to build a line for local trains separate from the tracks long-distance passengers trains between Berlin and Trebbin, but this was only completed to Ludwigsfelde by 1943. A separate terminal platform was built on the western side of the railway tracks for services from Berlin that terminated in Ludwigsfelde. Because of the war, the suburban line was electrified only as far as Lichterfelde Süd, so commuter trains to Ludwigsfelde had to be switched from the Berlin S-Bahn and then be hauled by steam locomotives. The S-Bahn fare zone was extended to Ludwigsfelde.

The engine plant was closed after the end of World War II and the car factory was dismantled to provide war reparations to the Soviet Union. The VEB Industriewerke Ludwigsfelde was established on the site in 1952 and it developed into a car factory. Ludwigsfelde thus remained an important industrial centre. Due to the growing impact of the division of Germany and division of Berlin, through traffic on the Anhalt Railway to Berlin was blockaded in 1952, as the route ran through West Berlin. Until the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, only S-Bahn services remained in operation to Teltow station, where passengers could change to continue to Ludwigsfelde. Other passenger operations as well as freight traffic used a connection to the Berlin Outer Ring, which was opened in the early 1950s, that had been built to the north of Ludwigsfelde.

In the late 1970s, work began on the electrification of the line. The contact wire from the south to Ludwigsfelde was taken into operation on 27 September 1981. This meant that the locomotives on most trains were changed there. The stop to enable the exchange of locomotives was also shown as a scheduled stop for express trains. As of 23 May 1982, electrically hauled freight trains could continue towards Seddin. The completion of the following sections could not be carried out as planned due to a lack of transformer capacity, but with the commissioning of the catenary to Berlin-Schöneweide on 2 May and to Berlin-Lichtenberg on 30 September 1984, the locomotive change in Ludwigsfelde was largely abandoned.

Platforms and tracks, view to the north

Ludwigsfelde was a stop for passenger trains from Berlin to Jüterbog and beyond during nearly all decades. Express and semi-fast trains did not stop at the station before 1945. From 1943 to 1945 there was dense suburban traffic between Ludwigsfelde and Lichterfelde Süd. The trains operated on an approximately equal-interval timetable during off-peak times every hour or every 40 minutes and at peak times every 20, sometimes every 10, minutes. Passenger trains from Berlin to Jüterbog and further south that did not stop in Teltow and Großbeeren during the existence of the separate suburban line stopped in Ludwigsfelde.

After the Second World War, the trains towards Berlin were gradually rerouted over the Berlin Outer Ring. Some trains took the new route over the south-eastern section of the Outer Ring, some remained on the old route, but all these trains ended in Teltow station from 1952, where it was possible to change to S-Bahn trains until the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961. While a relatively dense rail service still continued to run to Teltow in the first years after the construction of the wall, the number of trains was reduced over the next seven to eight years on weekdays and on weekends there were even a few less. Approximately the same number of trains connected Ludwigsfelde with Schönefeld airport, some also continued to Berlin-Schöneweide or other Berlin stations. Most of the traffic between Ludwigsfelde and East Berlin used Sputnik trains running on the Outer Ring from Genshagener Heide station, which was connected by dense bus connections to the main residential areas of the town. On occasion, individual express trains stopped at Ludwigsfelde in the 1970s and 1980s, such as an express from Aue (Sachs) to Berlin.[6]

After 1990, a more integrated timetable was established. Hourly services ran from the mid-1990s from Jüterbog via Berlin-Schönefeld to Berlin-Lichtenberg and further north. Railcars also ran every hour between Ludwigsfelde and Teltow. At times in the 1990s through trains ran from Ludwigsfelde to Potsdam Pirschheide station, but they were discontinued after a few years due to lack of demand.[6]

In 1998, the connection to Teltow was replaced by buses for several years during work to upgrade the Anhalt line. After the completion of the work on the line and the completion of the North–South mainline in Berlin in 2006, through trains ran again on the direct route to the city centre. The regional services towards Berlin-Schönefeld Airport station were abandoned with the exception of a train on weekend nights.

In the 2022 timetable Ludwigsfelde station was served by the following services. The RE 3 service runs between Schwedt or Stralsund via Berlin Hauptbahnhof and Berlin Südkreuz to Ludwigsfelde, continuing via Luckenwalde and Jüterbog to Lutherstadt Wittenberg or Elsterwerda. The RE 4 service runs every hour between Rathenow via Wustermark, Berlin Hauptbahnhof and Berlin Südkreuz to Ludwigsfelde and Falkenberg (Elster).

• Regional services RE 3: Stralsund – Greifswald – Pasewalk – Angermünde – Berlin – Ludwigsfelde – Jüterbog – Falkenberg (Elster) – Elsterwerda
• Regional services RE 3: Schwedt – Angermünde – Berlin – Ludwigsfelde – Jüterbog – Lutherstadt Wittenberg
• Regional services RE 4: Rathenow - Berlin - Ludwigsfelde - Jüterbog – Falkenberg

Until the 1930s, there was one side platform next to the station building for the line towards Halle and a small island platform for trains heading to Berlin, which could only be reached by passengers by crossing the track. Behind the passenger facilities there was a freight yard. After 1939, the station has had a side platform on the passing tracks for freight trains, which could be reached by a footbridge. After that the island platform was out of service.[8]

In 1943 a suburban railway station was opened on a separate bay platform to the north of the entrance building; on the northeast side of the station tracks there were sidings. After 1945 the terminal tracks were only used for storing carriages.

Listed railway workers' residence north of the entrance building

The wooden pedestrian bridge was replaced by a steel bridge around 1980 as part of the electrification of the line.[9] It led not only to the island platform but continued to the freight facilities on the east side of the station area.

The freight tracks to the east of the station have mostly been removed.

After 2000, the footbridge was removed and the island platform has since been reached by a tunnel. Today, the platform next to the entrance building is used for trains heading south and the island platform with its two platform edges is used for trains heading north and for overtaking movements. North of the station building there is still a platform on the track used for overtaking movements, which is used mostly for trains beginning or ending in Ludwigsfelde and running to and from Berlin. This is connected to the main track to the south of the platform next to the station building.

By 1980, the signalling systems had been upgraded on the Berlin–Halle line in preparation for the electrification of the line. Ludwigsfelde station received a new interlocking of the GS II sp64 class, with an existing signalbox being used as the operations room. Automatic block signalling was installed on the line towards Thyrow. During upgrading the line to 200 km/h, the relay interlocking was taken out of service in 2000 after just twenty years of operation and replaced by an electronic interlocking of the Simis C class.

Three official residences and an associated stable in the station area are heritage-listed. These are three two-storey brick buildings that date back to 1886.