The Müngsten Bridge is the highest railway bridge in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. The bridge is high and spans the valley of the river

Wupper The Wupper () is a right tributary of the Rhine in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Rising near Marienheide in western Sauerland it runs through the mountainous region of the Bergisches Land in Berg County and enters the Rhine at Le ...

, carrying the Wuppertal-Oberbarmen–Solingen railway between the cities of

Remscheid Remscheid () is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is, after Wuppertal and Solingen, the third-largest municipality in Bergisches Land, being located on the northern edge of the region, on the south side of the Ruhr area. Remscheid ha ...

and

Solingen Solingen (; ) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, 25 km east of Düsseldorf along the northern edge of the Bergisches Land, south of the Ruhr. After Wuppertal, it is the second-largest city in the Bergisches Land, and a member of ...

. It is used by line S7 of the Rhine-Ruhr S-Bahn and the RE47

Regional-Express In Germany, Luxembourg and Austria, the Regional-Express (; RE, or in Austria: REX) is a type of regional train. It is similar to a semi-fast train, with a top speed of and an average speed of about as it calls at fewer stations than ''R ...

service, although the RE47 service is being operated by a replacement bus service until 2026. Originally the bridge was named the ''Kaiser-Wilhelm-Brücke'' (Emperor Wilhelm Bridge) to honour Emperor Wilhelm I. After the end of the monarchy the bridge was renamed after the nearby settlement of Müngsten, which is close to the city limits of Solingen, Remscheid and

Wuppertal Wuppertal (; ) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, in western Germany, with a population of 355,000. Wuppertal is the seventh-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia and List of cities in Germany by population, 17th-largest in Germany. It ...

. Today, the settlement no longer exists, so Müngsten is simply a landmark.

History

Kaiser-Wilhelm-Br%C3%BCcke_M%C3%BCngstener_Br%C3%BCcke_1912

The first plans for a bridge connecting the cities of

and

go back as far as 1889. The Prussian Parliament approved the 5 million Marks required to build the bridge in 1890. Preparatory work began in 1893, first breaking of the earth was on 26 February 1894, and the bridge was finished in 1897. Anton von Rieppel (1852 – 1926), an architect and engineer, was in charge of the project. A memorial plaque at the foot of the bridge reminds one of his efforts. The opening of the bridge shrank the distance by rail between the cities of

and

from to . The bridge's official inauguration celebration took place on 15 July 1897. Emperor

Wilhelm II Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert; 27 January 18594 June 1941) was the last German Emperor and King of Prussia from 1888 until Abdication of Wilhelm II, his abdication in 1918, which marked the end of the German Empire as well as th ...

did not attend the ceremony in person. Prince Friedrich Leopold of Prussia attended the festivities instead. Emperor Wilhelm II visited the bridge two years later, on 12 August 1899.

Design

The overall length of the structure is . The main arch has a span of with

trestle bridge A trestle bridge is a bridge composed of a number of short spans supported by closely spaced frames usually carrying a railroad line. A trestle (sometimes tressel) is a rigid frame used as a support, historically a tripod used to support a st ...

sections either side of it supported by wide columns with a maximum height of . A total of of dynamite and of

black powder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, charcoal (which is mostly carbon), and potassium nitrate, potassium ni ...

were needed during construction of the foundations, and around of of iron and steel were used in the bridge's construction, with 950,000 rivets holding the structure together. Originally, the bridge was planned to be single-track. However, high future traffic growth projections led to the redesign as a dual-track bridge.

References

External links

*
Müngsten Bridge on bridge-info.org
* * Anton Rieppel

bahnhof-lette.de {{DEFAULTSORT:Mungsten Bridge Railway bridges in Germany Buildings and structures in Remscheid Buildings and structures in Solingen Bridges completed in 1897 Truss arch bridges Truss bridges in Germany Transport in North Rhine-Westphalia Wupper

History

Design

See also

References

External links