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The Alster Valley Railway is a railway line in Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

, which is nearly six-kilometre long. It is entirely double track and is served by line S1 of the Hamburg S-Bahn

Hamburg S-Bahn

The Hamburg S-Bahn is a railway network for public rapid mass transit in the Hamburg Metropolitan Region. Together the S-Bahn, the Hamburg U-Bahn, the AKN railway and the regional railway form the backbone of railway public transport in the city and the surrounding area...

 along its entire length. It leaves the extension of the Hamburg-Altona link line at Ohlsdorf station

Ohlsdorf station

Ohlsdorf is a train station in Hamburg, Germany, located at the junction of the Hamburg-Altona link line with the Alster Valley line and the Hamburg Airport line near the Ohlsdorf Cemetery.-History:...

 and runs to Poppenbüttel. The original plans envisaged an extension to Wohldorf or Volksdorf

Volksdorf

Volksdorf is a quarter of Hamburg. It is situated in the north east of the city, about 15 km from the center.Volksdorf belongs to the borough Wandsbek. It has an area af 11,6 km² and 19800 inhabitants.- References :...

.

History

Shortly after the turn of the century, several villages in the area around Hamburg, including enclaves

Enclave and exclave

In political geography, an enclave is a territory whose geographical boundaries lie entirely within the boundaries of another territory.An exclave, on the other hand, is a territory legally or politically attached to another territory with which it is not physically contiguous.These are two...

 of the city sought a connection to the city’s railway network. Apart from the Alster Valley line, this effort led to the construction of the Forest Villages line (Walddörferbahn), starting in 1912. This line later became part of the Hamburg U-Bahn

Hamburg U-Bahn

The Hamburg U-Bahn is a rapid transit system serving the cities of Hamburg, Norderstedt and Ahrensburg in Germany. Although technically an underground, most of the system's track length is above ground. The network is interconnected with the city's S-Bahn system, which also has underground...

 and is now mostly served by line U1. Just one year after the signing of the Ohlsdorf Treaty, which was the basis for the Hamburg-Altona City and Suburban Railway—the precursor of the S-Bahn—on 12 December 1905, a community group formed to promote the extension of the suburban railway through Ohlsdorf

Ohlsdorf

Ohlsdorf is a municipality in the district of Gmunden in Upper Austria, Austria....

 to the Alster Valley and beyond.

The Havestadt & Contag Company of Berlin was engaged to plan the building of the line. It was planned that the would be built as follows: the line would run from Ohlsdorf on the Hamburg-Altona link line to Poppenbüttel

Poppenbüttel

Poppenbüttel is a quarter in the borough Wandsbek of Hamburg, Germany. In 2006 the population was 21,930.-History:Poppenbüttel became a part of Hamburg in 1937....

, where the line would divide. An eastern branch would run to Volksdorf and a western branch to Wohldorf. Trains would serve the two branches equally.

The Alster Valley Company (Alstertal Bahn GmbH), which had been founded on 4 May 1908 to operate the route, negotiated with the Prussia

Prussia

Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...

n government and the city of Hamburg. Under the compromise negotiated, it was agreed that the line would only initially run only to Poppenbüttel, as the following villages to be served were exclaves of Hamburg and thus needed an additional special license. The initial section was planned to be double track and electrified throughout from the beginning.

The license for the less than six-kilometre section between Ohlsdorf and Poppenbüttel was issued on 3 December 1912 by Hamburg and on 31 May 1913 by Prussia. It was intended that the line would go into operation three years later.

Meanwhile, Alstertalbahn GmbH was converted into a joint-stock company and operated under the name of Alstertalbahn-Aktien-Gesellschaft (ABAG). The main shareholder in the company in 1912 was the entrepreneur Johann von Wentzel, a developer of the valley.

Construction and operation

A Berlin-based company, Julius Berger AG was commissioned in 1913 to carry out the works. However, since the First World War began a year later, work was quickly brought to a halt by material and labour shortages. ABAG also had difficulties in selling its land and thus got into financial difficulties. The planned start-up date thus could not be met.

Under the difficult conditions the line—originally single track—was completed and authorised to operate by the state police. Temporary operations began on 15 January 1918, but operated with petrol-powered railcars, rather than electric railcars. Not enough copper was available for overhead wires. The remaining work was completed on 10 July 1920, six months after the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles

Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...

. By this time ABAG had runs out of funds and its main shareholder liquidated it on 10 November 1920. In 1922, the Stormarn

Stormarn

Stormarn is a district in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is bounded by the districts of Segeberg and Ostholstein, the city of Lübeck, the district of Lauenburg, and the city-state of Hamburg.-History:...

 district, in which the villages were located, took over ABAG’s shares and continued construction of the line. Electric operations were fully commissioned on 24 March 1924.

On 22 April 1940, the electrical system was partially converted. In addition to the existing system of electrification with 6.3 kV at 25 Hz alternating current

Alternating current

In alternating current the movement of electric charge periodically reverses direction. In direct current , the flow of electric charge is only in one direction....

, a third rail was installed at the side of the track with 1.2 kV direct current

Direct current

Direct current is the unidirectional flow of electric charge. Direct current is produced by such sources as batteries, thermocouples, solar cells, and commutator-type electric machines of the dynamo type. Direct current may flow in a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through...

. Parallel electrical operations continued until 1955, when the overhead line was removed. The Alster Valley Railway was therefore the first line of the Hamburg S-Bahn to operate on its current electrical system.