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| Soligen Van Hool 268 at the station. |
It
was an 80th
birthday party. The subject was one Helmut Buser formerly of the
Essen transport authority who had been instrumental in the adoption
of low floor buses in the UK. The celebratory public transport jaunt
was organised by Andrew Braddock, also a leading light in the
introduction of low floor buses. In true Braddock style, the action
packed day involved much leaping on and off various forms of public
transport with minutes to spare, something which works alarmingly
often.
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| UH III 59 at the station |
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| 59 at Burg showing the trailer towing equipment. |
Quite why an 80 year old German gentleman and his wife would
enjoy such a thing you may query, but they said that had enormously
as it was so good to speak and hear English spoken as she should be.
Such a group has never had that accolade before.
For
me there were two high spots. On being deposited by some older
members of DB’s rolling stock at Soligen station, we were met by
representatives of the Obus Museum Soligen with one of the museum’s
stock, a 1959 Uerdingen-Henschel UH III trolleybus number 59.
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| 59 on the turntable at Burg with the birthday boy. |
The museum owns three trolleys and a trailer and is hoping to repatriate a Soligen built TS type from Argentina. The vehicles run hires and also operate once a month from April to October on line 683, the object of our visit. Full details are on obus-museum-soligen.de Soligen is one of three German trolleybus systems, the other two being at Eberswalde (2 lines, 12 vehicles) and Esslingden (2 lines and 9 buses).
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| A Hess off wire heading for Burg centre. |
Soligen, opened on June 19 1952, has 6 lines, 681 to
686 and a fleet of 50 made up of 15 Berkhofs, 20 Van Hools and 15
Hess dual modes, all artic and dating from 2001 to 2009. The station
is quite away out of town so we had a run into the Stadmitte where
the lines all meet to join the 683.
Throughout we were given a
commentary by the driver’s daughter from whom we learned Soligen,
population 163,500, is known as the city of blades owing to a knife
industry, making it a sort of German Sheffield, and home to Haribo
sweets. We then took the 683 to the adjoining town of Burg which
involves a delightful descent through woods. The terminus at Burg is
equipped with an electric turntable by the river. However, the
current fleet of all artics are too long, so its use is restricted to
preserved vehicles only, delightful.
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| A Hess at Vohwinkel terminus |
The modern kit on 683 is the
Hess buses which now extend to Burg centre across the river using
auxiliary diesels for this part of the run. 59 made a spirited uphill
return, as indeed it performed throughout, testament to its
construction and excellent overhead, no slowing down through
junctions here. The other end of 683 is equally thrilling as the
route terminates currently under the famous and unique Wuppertal
Schweberbahn at its Vohwinkel terminus. In early 2014 it is hoped to
extend 683 800 metres to Wuppertal station, again using auxiliary
power for the new section.
Thanks to Roger Davies for this article and pictures. All pictures © Roger Davies.
The second section of the article will include information and pictures about the Wuppertal Schweberbahn (Suspension Railway)
