The Pfrimm Viaduct (), colloquially also called the Marnheim Bridge (''Marnheimer Brücke''), was a

railway bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somet ...

near Marnheim in the county of

Donnersbergkreis The Donnersbergkreis is a district (''Kreis'') in the middle of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Neighboring districts are Bad Kreuznach, Alzey-Worms, Bad Dürkheim, Kaiserslautern, Kusel. History The district was created in 1969 by merging the dist ...

in the German state of

Rhineland-Palatinate Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; ; ; ) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the sixteen states. Mainz is the capital and largest city. Other cities are ...

. It was built as a stone

arch An arch is a curved vertical structure spanning an open space underneath it. Arches may support the load above them, or they may perform a purely decorative role. As a decorative element, the arch dates back to the 4th millennium BC, but stru ...

and

truss bridge A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements, typically straight, may be stressed from tension, compression, or ...

from 1872 to 1874, was 260 metres long and 30 metres high, and carried the

Donnersberg Railway The Donnersberg Railway () is a branch line from Alzey to Kirchheimbolanden, which originally ran as far as Marnheim. Although it was once part of the main line from Kaiserslautern to Mainz, the Pfrimm Viaduct was blown up in 1945 during the S ...

from Hungerberg over the valley of the

Pfrimm The Pfrimm () is a , left or western tributary of the Rhine in the Rhineland-Palatinate (Germany). Course The Pfrimm rises in the southern part of the Donnersbergkreis. Its spring lies in the northern part of the Palatinate Forest Nature P ...

to the

Zeller Valley Railway References External links StreckeninformationenFörderverein Eistalbahn e. V.– Fahrplaninformationen, Betriebsführung und Instandhaltung Infrastrukturbetreiber der Strecke Railway lines in Rhineland-Palatinate North Palatinate Palatinate ...

, which is only open at weekends today. The bridge is a

protected monument In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

and forms the "Gateway to the

Zellertal Zellertal is a municipality in the Donnersbergkreis district, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. The villages of , Harxheim and Niefernheim form Zellertal. Zellertal is located in the eponymous region, which in turn is part of the Palatinate w ...

" (''Tor zum Zellertal'').

Location

The viaduct was built east of Marnheim. The remains of its northern stone arch bridge are located on the northeastern edge of the village at about . It is 45 metres south of the B 47 and 200 metres north of the confluence of the ''Goldbrunnengraben'' ''(Goldbrunnenbächlein)'' and the

Rhine The Rhine ( ) is one of the List of rivers of Europe, major rivers in Europe. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein border, then part of the Austria–Swit ...

tributary, the Pfrimm, and carries a field track. About 240 metres south-southeast of the centre of the northern part of the bridge at a height of about near the south bank of the Pfrimm are stone pier remains of the southern

abutment An abutment is the substructure at the ends of a bridge span or dam supporting its superstructure. Single-span bridges have abutments at each end that provide vertical and lateral support for the span, as well as acting as retaining walls ...

History and description

The Pfrimm Viaduct was built as a 260-metre-long and 30-metre-high stone

and

with a superstructure of lattice and steel girder design between the years 1872 and 1874. Its bridge piers were built on post

foundations Foundation(s) or The Foundation(s) may refer to: Common uses * Foundation (cosmetics), a skin-coloured makeup cream applied to the face * Foundation (engineering), the element of a structure which connects it to the ground, and transfers loads f ...

. On 20 March 1945, Shortly before the end of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

the bridge was blown up by withdrawing

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the German Army (1935–1945), ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmac ...

troops. The link to

Mainz Mainz (; #Names and etymology, see below) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate, and with around 223,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 35th-largest city. It lies in ...

via

Alzey Alzey () is a ''Verband''-free town – one belonging to no ''Verbandsgemeinde'' – in the Alzey-Worms district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the fifth-largest town in Rhenish Hesse, after Mainz, Worms, Germany, Worms, Ingelheim am Rhei ...

was thus cut. After the war there were attempts to rebuild the viaduct, but they foundered – as did a new route without a viaduct – due to the cost. In addition the railway had transferred services to buses. Since the construction of the B 47 north of the viaduct, when the adjoining railway embankment (in the upper photograph the formerly covered stones are still visible during related work) was removed, the northern bridge remains have stood isolated in the open.

References

''Geschichte der Marnheimer Eisenbahn''
, at kirchheimbolanden.de
in ''Rundgang'', at kirchheimbolanden.de Klaus D. Holzborn: ''Eisenbahn-Reviere Palatinate'', Verlag Transpress, Berlin, 1993,

External links

at kirchheimbolanden.de

in ''Rundgang'', at kirchheimbolanden.de {{coord, 49, 38, 16, N, 8, 2, 49.1, E, region:DE-RP_type:landmark, display=title 1870s architecture Buildings and structures demolished in 1945 Railway bridges in Germany bridges in Rhineland-Palatinate Heritage sites in Rhineland-Palatinate Donnersbergkreis