Karlsruhe Hauptbahnhof is a railway station in the German city of Karlsruhe. The station is classified as a Category 1 station, as it is a major hub where several railways connect.
History
Old station
When the Baden Mainline was built between Mannheim and Basel, the original Karlsruhe station was built on Kriegsstraße between Ettlinger Tor and Mendelssohnplatz about 500 metres south of Karlsruher Marktplatz, the central square of Karlsruhe. The station was designed by Friedrich Eisenlohr and it was opened on 1 April 1843 with two platforms. From the beginning, it was designed as a through station. South of the station there was a locomotive depot and to its east there was a freight yard and a central workshop.
It was built to Irish gauge (), as were all railways built by the Grand Duchy of Baden State Railway in the early days. It was converted to standard gauge in 1855. In the following years other routes were connected to Karlsruhe station: in 1859 the line to Stuttgart, in 1863 the Maxau Railway () connecting with the Palatinate, in 1870 the Rhine Railway to Mannheim, in 1879 the Kraichgau Railway and in 1895 the strategic railway from Graben-Neudorf via Rastatt to Haguenau. The tracks ran at ground level and the approach lines were built with sharp curves because of the confined spaces.
The increased rail traffic and the resulting frequent closures of the level crossings disrupted the ever-growing city and made its expansion more difficult. After several years of discussion, which considered, among other things, the raising of the level of the tracks, the Baden parliament decided in 1902 to relocate the station to a site one kilometre south of the existing site.
After the opening of the new station in 1913, the existing railway station lost its function as a railway station and continued to be used until the 1960s as a market hall. Today, the Baden State Theatre is located on the former railway yard. Some of the remaining tracks were used over the decades as sidings, but have since been entirely removed. The freight yard was used as a repair shop until 1997. Ludwig-Erhard-Allee was built in the meantime on the grounds of the freight yard, the workshop area is currently being redeveloped with blocks of flats (2010).
New station
The station building, which continues in use, was built about a kilometre south of its predecessor between Südstadt and the marshalling yard. Construction began in 1910 to the plans of August Stürzenacker and the station was opened on the night of 22/23 October 1913. The station and access tracks were built in the district of Beiertheim and also occupied a significant part of the Stadtgarten (city garden, the location of Karlsruhe Zoo) and the garden behind the Stephanienbad (now Paul-Gerhardt) church. This resulted in the cutting down of the then oldest eastern cottonwood poplar in Europe.
The platforms and the approach tracks were built on an embankment, with access via a pedestrian underpass. The entrance building is on the north side of the tracks. The building has both neoclassical and Art Nouveau features. East of the station building there is a second underpass, which originally served as an outlet for arriving passengers and was used for a time mainly as an underground car park and a few years ago for secure bicycle parking, but it is now back in use as a pedestrian underpass. A five-span, steel concourse was built to cover five island platforms. Later an eleventh platform track was built and, in the 1980s, three more platform tracks were created south of the station concourse. West of the station building a station annex was built with four terminal tracks, where the lines from the Palatinate and Graben-Neudorf (via Eggenstein) terminated. The construction of the new station also affected the access routes. Thus, the former stations at Mühlburger Tor in Karlsruhe and in Beiertheim and Rüppurr were closed. The stations in Mühlburg and Durlach were relocated and the tracks of the line to Mühlacker, which had previously ended in Durlach, were extended to the new Hauptbahnhof, so that there were now four tracks between Durlach and Karlsruhe. Also the new Karlsruhe-West station was opened for passenger services.
The station forecourt was designed by Wilhelm Vitalli. The square with a rectangular ground plan is surrounded by arcades. At the end of the square to the east and the west are two hotel buildings and on the northern side is the entrance to the Stadtgarten and the commercial buildings. The station forecourt is a typical ensemble of urban architecture from the last years before the First World War. East of the station was the railway post office, which had a railway siding on the tramway as well.