The railway estimates the damage to routes, stations and vehicles in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia at around 1.3 billion euros. Not all damage will be fixed quickly.
Deutsche Bahn is confident that the major damage in the areas affected by the flood can be repaired by the end of the year and that traffic will be largely normal again.
In some regions, however, especially in Rhineland-Palatinate, it could take longer. “At the Eifel and Ahr, for example, nothing can be seen of the previous routes and connections,” said Volker Hentschel, the board member for facility and maintenance management at the DB Netz subsidiary, on Friday. “We’re talking about months, if not years in some places.”
The railway estimates the damage to routes, stations and vehicles in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia at around 1.3 billion euros. Talks are currently underway with the federal government about funding. 600 kilometers of tracks are affected, as well as 50 bridges and dozen of stations and stops. 180 level crossings, 40 signal boxes and more than 1000 catenary and signal masts are so badly damaged that they will probably have to be replaced, said Hentschel.
Whole sections would also have to be renewed. These included several routes via Euskirchen, such as the Erfttalbahn, the Eifelstecke and the Voreifelbahn; also the NRW route of the S9 line from Wuppertal-Vohwinkel to Essen-Stehle and part of the Ruhr-Sieg route from Hagen-Plettenberg.
Jane Stock is a technology author, who has written for 24 Hours World. She writes about the latest in technology news and trends, and is always on the lookout for new and innovative ways to improve his audience’s experience.
