The Berlin–Dresden railway is a double track, electrified main line railway in the German states of Berlin, Brandenburg and Saxony, which was originally built and operated by the Berlin-Dresden Railway Company (Berlin-Dresdener Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft). It runs from Berlin through the southern Teltow countryside and then between Lower Lusatia and Fläming Heath through Elsterwerda and the Großenhainer Pflege countryside to Dresden.
Upgrades completed in December 2017 enabled maximum speeds of . By 2020 new signalling should allow speeds of .
History
Up to 1945
In 1848 the Berlin-Anhalt Railway Company opened the Jüterbog–Röderau line, connecting with the Leipzig–Dresden line and creating the first direct rail link between Berlin and Dresden. In 1872 the Berlin-Dresden Railway Company was founded to build a competing a line via Elsterwerda that was shorter. This route was opened on 17 June 1875. Long-distance traffic between Berlin and Dresden was divided between the two routes until the end of World War II.
1 October 1877 management of the line was taken over by Prussian state railways. On 24 January 1887 Saxony and Prussia contracted a treaty, under which ownership of the company passed to Prussia from 1 April 1887. This treaty also provided that the Elsterwerda–Dresden section was resold to the Saxon government on 1 April 1888, when it became part of the Royal Saxon State Railways.
At both ends of the line new stations were built, the Dresdner Bahnhof (Dresden station) in Berlin and Berliner Bahnhof (Berlin station) in Dresden. Both stations were used only briefly. In 1882 the Dresden station in Berlin (located on the site of the present-day Gleisdreieck U-Bahn station and the former postal station in Luckenwalder Strasse) was closed for passenger traffic. The line’s Berlin terminus was moved a little further north to the Anhalter Bahnhof (Anhalt station). A little later, the Berlin train station in Dresden was abandoned as part of the redevelopment of the Dresden railway node. In its place the Dresden-Friedrichstadt station was built, which has been used since 1894 for freight and regional services. Since that time, long distance services have turned off towards Radebeul-Zitzschewig on the Leipzig–Dresden line and Dresden-Neustadt to Dresden Hauptbahnhof. In contrast, freight trains to and from Leipzig use the Berlin–Dresden railway from Radebeul-Naundorf station to Friedrichstadt.
From 1875 until World War I the Prussian military railway ran parallel with the line from Berlin to Zossen. This line was dismantled in 1919. Between 1901 and 1904 high-speed trials were carried out with electric locomotives and railcars and speeds of up to were achieved. A new railway bridge on the Dresden line had to be built south of the S-Bahn station at Mariendorf (now Attilastraße) as a result of the construction of the Teltow canal in 1905.
In 1936 a high-speed express service commenced between Berlin and Dresden using the Henschel-Wegmann Train, taking 100 minutes. The Berlin suburb train operations were electrified in 1939 and 1940. Berlin S-Bahn services commenced on 15 May 1939 between Priesterweg and Mahlow and on 6 October 1940 the S-Bahn was extended to Rangsdorf. The S-Bahn shared tracks in southern Berlin with long-distance passenger and freight trains. At the end of the 1930s work began on the new track to separate the S-Bahn and long-distance tracks, but by the beginning of the Second World War this work was not completed.
In April 1945, S-Bahn services ceased as a result of the war.
Reopening in 1945
After the end of the war in 1945 the railway line was seriously damaged by the allies. In addition the bridges over the Teltow Canal in Berlin were blown up in the last days of the war by the German army. Later the line’s second track was dismantled to provide reparations to the Soviet Union. Only two tracks have been restored on these bridges. Services resumed between August and October 1945. Between Mariendorf and Marienfelde stations S-Bahn services and the remaining passenger and freight services ran on a common two-track section. Between Rangsdorf and Wünsdorf steam suburban trains operated to connect with the S-Bahn.