The Borkumer Kleinbahn is a 900 mm (2 ft 11+7⁄16 in) narrow gauge railway on the German island of Borkum in the North Sea. It is the oldest island railway (German: Inselbahn) in Germany, beginning operation in 1888.[1]
Line
The 7.5 km (5 mi) long line connects the port with the town of Borkum.[1] It is double tracked since the early 20th century.[2]
A map of the island showing the railway line
History
In 1879, tracks for a horse-drawn railway line were laid for the construction of a new lighthouse. The tracks were converted for locomotive-hauled trains about 10 years later,[2] and the line opened in 1888 as a successor of the horsedrawn line.[3] The network reached its peak length in 1938,[2] with a track length of about 45 km (28 mi).[1] The line celebrated its 125th anniversary on June 15, 2013.[4]
Rolling stock
The fleet consists of multiple passenger cars, diesel locomotives, steam locomotives and a Wismar railbus, which was built in 1940.[1] A steam locomotive from the Bäderbahn Molli is scheduled to run on the line in summer 2019.[5] Both Bäderbahn Molli and the Borkumer Kleinbahn have the same 900 mm (2 ft 11+7⁄16 in) track gauge.[6]
^ abcFunck, Nicole; Narten, Michael; Hanewald, Roland (2017). Reise Know-How Borkum [Travel know-how Borkum] (in German) (11th ed.). Reise Know-How Verlag Peter Rump GmbH. pp. 74, 75. ISBN978-3-8317-4161-8.
^Museumsbahnen: 250 historische Eisenbahnstrecken in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz [Museum railways: 250 historical railway lines in Germany, Austria and Switzerland] (in German). Bassermann Verlag. 2012. p. 59. ISBN978-3-641-68964-3.
