Magdeburg-Wittenberge railway

Wolmirstedt station in 1880

The line was opened in three phases. On 7 July 1849, the 99 km-long section from Magdeburg to Seehausen was opened. On 5 August 1849 this was followed by the eight km-long section to the Elbe levee. Since the Elbe bridge was under construction, passengers had to cross to Wittenberge by ferry. On 25 October 1851, a wooden, single-track bridge was opened to traffic. To avoid this low-level structure obstructing shipping, part of it was built as a swing bridge. During the construction of the Berlin–Hamburg line, the terminus had been designed to integrate with the line from Magdeburg. The station building was originally located between the junction of the two lines.

As well as a direct line from Magdeburg to Hamburg, the route was initially seen as a route between the coast and central and southern Germany. This service did not prove as profitable as initially suggested to shareholders. In addition, in 1855 a large part of the line had to be rebuilt as a result of several floods in Altmark. In 1863, the company was bought by the Magdeburg-Halberstadt Railway Company. A direct connection did not exist between the two companies' lines and trains had to use a short piece of the Leipzig line.

In 1867, the MHE received a concession to build the Berlin–Lehrte railway (also known as the Lehrter Railway or Lehrter Bahn). A direct line already existed via Magdeburg, but the new route via Stendal was more direct and thus services would be quicker. The railway facilities in Stendal had to be rebuilt to make it easy for passengers to change trains. The Lehrter Railway runs south of the old town of Wittenberg from east to west, while the old line ran on the eastern edge of the town. The new Lehrter Railway has a connection with a relocated line from Wittenberge to the west of Stendal. This allowed two routes to share the new Stendal station. The diverted line to Wittenberge passes around the town along the north western boundary and then returns to its old route to the north. In addition to the Lehrter Railway, which opened through Stendal in 1871, the so-called America Line opened in 1873 from Stendal via Uelzen to Bremen.

In subsequent years operations in Magdeburg became increasingly unsatisfactory. The transfer of trains to the Leipzig railway was difficult and the Elbe river prevented the expansion of the rail facilities. Hence the old idea of a common route through the ring of forts was taken up again. As the urban area was growing and the areas outside the walls were being settled, the fortifications were increasingly seen as a nuisance. There still had to be lengthy negotiations with the Prussian military before the railways were offered a suitable site along the northern and western moat. The line was built jointly by the MHE, BPME and MLE. The new Magdeburg Central station was built as an island station (with the main station building between the tracks) because the three railway companies were still working separately. The eastern station tracks were built and operated by the MLE and the western tracks by the BPME and the MHE. The first train ran on 15 May 1873 to Burg; work continued, however, until 1893. During this period, in 1876, the MLE was taken over by the MHE. Three years later the MHE was nationalised.

Facade of Magdeburg Hauptbahnhof

Osterburg station

A class 425 (left) waits in Magdeburg on its way to Wittenberge

After the takeover of the MHE, the Prussian state railways acquired other companies. The state railways established royal railway divisions, each called a Königlichen Eisenbahndirektion (KED). The Magdeburg-Wittenberge Railway came under the new Magdeburg KED. North of Stendal the line came under the Hanover KED.

A new Wittenberge Elbe bridge was built between 1883 and 1884. Most of the old wooden bridge was dilapidated and was replaced by a wrought iron truss bridge. The swing bridge was retained, but was replaced in a second reconstruction by a steel structure between 1905 and 1910. At this time, the bridge was widened to include a second track on its northern or eastern side. The southern track also adapted to permit road vehicles to cross, as there was no road bridge in Wittenberge.

After the founding of Deutsche Reichsbahn (German State Railways) in 1920, the divisions were rearranged. The Magdeburg–Stendal section was assigned to the newly established Hanover railway division (Reichsbahndirektion, RBD); the Stendal–Wittenberge section was assigned to the Hamburg RBD. In addition to local rail services in the Prussian Province of Saxony, the line was also used by mainline services connecting Dresden, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Wittenberge and Hamburg.

Towards the end of the Second World War, the Wittenberg Elbe bridge was blown up. By the autumn of 1945 Soviet pioneers had temporarily restored the southern track of the bridge. The bridge was reduced to a single track line as, as during the Soviet occupation the second track was removed as reparations to the Soviet Union. The northern track of the bridge was restored temporarily in 1947. Due to the lack of a rail track, however, only road traffic ran along this track. In 1950, the second track was re-commissioned and road traffic returned to the southern track.

The route was developed in the coming years as the most important north–south link in East German, bypassing Berlin. The second track was quickly restored. Because operations over the bridge, despite its two tracks, was restricted to a speed of 30 km/h, it became a bottleneck. In 1957, the superstructure of the bridge was replaced using its old pillars.

In 1969 the Magdeburg S-Bahn was established. This involved adapting all the lines' infrastructure as far as Zielitz, which was selected as the northern terminus, to support a mixed operation of S-Bahn, regional, long-distance and freight traffic. Similarly, overhead lines were installed to support electric operations. North of the village of Zielitz, a four-track Zielitz station was built, letting S-Bahn trains reverse and freight trains continue without obstruction. Continuing towards Magdeburg a pair of tracks was built for the S-Bahn from the junction with the line from Oebisfelde, bypassing the Magdeburg-Rothensee marshalling yard. From Magdeburg-Neustadt the S-Bahn shared the common line with other train traffic. S-Bahn operations commenced on 29 September 1974.

Further electrification was carried out in the 1980s. Electric operations were extended to Stendal in 1982 and to Wittenberge in 1987. The East Germany Railways built a new bridge over the Elbe without obstructing operations. The new bridge was the longest railway bridge built during the existence of East Germany.

• Janikowski, Andreas; Ott, Jörg (2002). Deutschlands S-Bahnen (in German). Stuttgart: transpress. ISBN 3-613-71195-8.