History of Rail Transport in Germany - Epoch 0 (1835-1870)

Epoch 0 (1835-1870)

Political disunity of three dozen states and a pervasive conservatism made it difficult to build railways in the 1830s but the growing importance of the Zollverein made the construction of a coherent infrastructure a necessity. The initial impetus to build was hampered by complicated negotiations on land ownership. However, by the 1840s, trunk lines did link the major cities; each German state was responsible for the lines within its own borders.

During the 1820s, the nobility favored costly and economically inefficient (but prestigious) canal projects over railroads. In the 1830s, the growing liberal middle classes supported railways as a progressive innovation with benefits for the German people in general as well as for the shareholders in the joint stock companies that built and operated the railroads. Though private concerns such as the Nuremberg-Fürth railroad were superseded by government railroad companies in the 1840s, the government companies copied many of the private companies' methods and organizational structures. Economist Friedrich List, speaking for the liberals, summed up the advantages to be derived from the development of the railway system in 1841:

First, as a means of national defense, it facilitates the concentration, distribution and direction of the army. 2. It is a means to the improvement of the culture of the nation…. It brings talent, knowledge and skill of every kind readily to market. 3. It secures the community against dearth and famine, and against excessive fluctuation in the prices of the necessaries of life. 4. It promotes the spirit of the nation, as it has a tendency to destroy the Philistine spirit arising from isolation and provincial prejudice and vanity. It binds nations by ligaments, and promotes an interchange of food and of commodities, thus making it feel to be a unit. The iron rails become a nerve system, which, on the one hand, strengthens public opinion, and, on the other hand, strengthens the power of the state for police and governmental purposes.

Lacking a technological base at first, the Germans imported their engineering and hardware from Britain, but quickly learned the skills needed to operate and expand the railways. In many cities, the new railway shops were the centers of technological awareness and training, so that by 1850, Germany was self-sufficient in meeting the demands of railroad construction, and the railways were a major impetus for the growth of the new steel industry. Observers found, that already as early as 1890, ( 14 years after the invention of the Otto cycle engine by Nikolaus August Otto and his partner Eugen Langen ) their engineering became superior to Britain’s.