Darmstadt Central Station - Planning

Planning

Beginning in 1901, four different designs, which were focused primarily on a final solution for managing traffic, were developed and discarded. In 1905, the city and the Prussian-Hessian Railway division in Mainz finally agreed on a fifth draft. It stipulated that a new through station would be built on a then green-field site about 800 metres west of the old stations. The greater distance from the city centre would be compensated by providing a connecting by tram. The post office would have its own railway post office north of the entrance building, connected by the "Post Bridge" (Poststeg), its own covered bridge, to trains at the mail and baggage platforms below it. The Post Bridge was demolished in 1994.

The tracks in the southern part of the station precinct were placed in a cutting so that the streets could be built over it. The same was true of the station building: passengers enter the station building at street level, pass through the station on the same level and reach the platforms by stairs from an overpass (for some years there have also been lifts). Parallel to this there was a separate overpass for luggage and the express freight service (this was converted in the last renovation into a bicycle parking garage). The northern tracks of the station precinct are on an embankment as the station site slopes down to the north.

An architectural competition was announced for the construction of the station building. At the express request of Grand Duke Ernst Ludwig, the new station would be built by a modern master builder (Baumeister), not a style architect (Stilarchitekten). Kaiser Wilhelm II refrained for diplomatic reasons from intervening on the issue, although he intervened in the design of many other station buildings on the Prussian state railways.

A total of 75 designs were submitted. Friedrich Pützer and Friedrich Klingholz each received a second prize. The contract was awarded in 1908 to Friedrich Pützer. It took him two years to complete his designs, into which he also incorporated some good ideas from the designs of his competitors.

Construction began in 1906 and was completed in 1912 at a total cost of 17 million marks. At that time, the experts made a fairly cautious judgements about the new building: "it has some very efficient services, but no great ideas." Today the building is regarded as groundbreaking and it is protected as a monument.

A water tower was built at the Dornheimer Weg bridge to supply the locomotives with water in 1910. This building, which was set to be demolished in 1978, is also now under monument protection.