Albtal-Verkehrs-Gesellschaft

Stefanie Haaks ( Commercial Director ) Christian Höglmeier ( technical director )

The Albtal traffic -Gesellschaft mbH (AVG ) is a transport company that operates rail and bus. It belongs to 100 percent of the city of Karlsruhe and operates the commuter train and a portion of the bus and coach transport in the Karlsruhe region and beyond its borders, as well as transport of goods by rail. It also operates a travel agency and builds and maintains a portion of the traffic of their railway lines.

The AVG is a member of the collective organization of the federal treasury and non-federally owned railways in Germany ( TBNE ).

Corporate Development

The AVG was founded in 1957 to take over the Alb Valley Railway and the railway line Busenbach - Ittersbach. Since 1957, she operates this railway line, she built 1957-1966 by narrow gauge on an electric standard gauge track and coupled it with the Karlsruhe tram network. Since 1975, she could through the construction of railway lines, the use of existing railway lines DB and the acquisition of existing railway lines continue to expand their activities and build a light rail system in the region of Karlsruhe. AVG provides in this context tram services in Karlsruhe and Heilbronn. Due to the continuous expansion of the route network and compression of schedules also increased ridership: from about 6 million passengers in 1960 over 8.1 million (1985 ), 19 million (1990 ), 32.8 million (1996 ) to 70 million in 2009.

From the beginning, there was a close cooperation with transport operators Karlsruhe ( VBK ), which is expressed in a common management, the use of joint workshops and a shared vehicle pool. Since the 1980s, following the division of labor between the two transport companies has emerged: while the VBK is responsible for the operation of the inner-city tram and bus connections in Karlsruhe, operates the AVG as railway undertakings the regional rail transport. As part of the expansion of the light rail network cooperation with Deutsche Bahn and Stadtwerke Heilbronn showed beyond.

In addition to the expansion of the rail network in the regions of Karlsruhe and Heilbronn, the AVG operated in rail freight transport. Here, the operation of the own routes ( Albtalbahn, Murgtalbahn, Kraichtalbahn, Kraichgaubahn ) as well as various sidings available in the Karlsruhe area in the foreground, also transports the AVG garbage trains between Bruchsal and Mannheim. In 2009 410 thousand tons of cargo were transported. In the rail distance freight AVG has so far not become active. The freight traffic on the road has now been abandoned AVG.

To make route expansion and operation of the rail connections as smoothly as possible, which AVG tries to take over the routes served by it or to lease long term by Deutsche Bahn. So they could take over the management in 1986 on the Hardt Railway of the German Federal Railways and acquire the route in 2001. In 1994, she acquired the branch line Bruchsal-Menzingen/Odenheim of the SWEG. Lease long term, they could Kraichgaubahn in 1996, the Enztalbahn and the Murg Valley in 2000. Moreover, took over the AVG, the three non-electrified stitch lines Maulbronn City Maulbronn West (1999 ), Rastatt Winter village and Hinterweidenthal - Bundenthal - Rumbach (2007), to preserve them before storing. Overall, the AVG operates as a railway infrastructure company owned and leased lines with a length of 284.6 km.

Karlsruhe Model

The AVG is mainly known by the exemplary implementation of a dual-system Stadtbahn traffic as the first company nationwide ( "Karlsruhe model "). Trains run as suburban or regional trains from remote locations to Karlsruhe, where they pass through the city center tram as to then again as S- or regional train to serve the surrounding area. For the first time the system was changing from one train to a tram in the same vehicle, which had to be equipped for both systems. Passengers can save yourself so transfers between train and tram.

1992, a tram ride from the city of Karlsruhe was extended out using the existing railway infrastructure in the surrounding area to Bretten. The light rail vehicles of the type GT8-100C/2S and GT8-100D/2S-M go there with two current systems: the Karlsruhe tram network with 750 volts DC and after the transition to electrified railway lines with 15 kV, 16.7 Hz AC voltage. In addition to the different electrical systems, differences in safety technology, flanges, radio, etc. are taken into account.

In Karlsruhe are now 121 two- car operating system. Four of them belong to the DB Regio and be guided by it as 450 series. Today, the Karlsruhe model called (called abroad also tram-train ) have because of the enormous passenger growth model for many other cities at home and abroad who are planning a light rail system on tram and railway lines or already implemented (eg Saarbrücken and Kassel).

Lines

AVG currently operates the rail traffic to the Karlsruhe model on the following lines:

Since December 12, 2010, divided into two parts ( Öhringen - Albtalbahnhof and Tullastraße - Achern )

Moreover operates the AVG still 15 kilometers long, Palatine Wieslauter train from Hinterweidenthal east to Bundenthal - Rumbach and leads here in conjunction with DB Regio seasonal traffic through. For deployed for this since the 2010 season, the historical Esslinger railcars of AVG and diesel railcar class 628, which were replaced in December 2010 by railcar Class 642.

By contrast, also circulating in the region of Karlsruhe line S3 Karlsruhe Bruchsal -Heidelberg -Mannheim -Ludwigshafen -Speyer- Germersheim not operated by the AVG, but by DB Regio Rhein Neckar as part of the S- Bahn Rhein Neckar. In contrast to the AVG routes operate on the S3 electric railcars of Class 425.2.

The total passenger traveled by the Albtal transport company route length is 460.1 km, of which 284.6 kilometers of the AVG and the rest are operated by DB Netz AG.

Two car system 898 of AVG type GT8-100D/2S-M

Railcars Albtalbahn in the pedestrian zone Kaiser Road ( 1978)

Diesel 468 Albtal Traffic society in shunting, Epping, December 30, 2005

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