page_title: Ulm–Sigmaringen railway
section_title: 1890–1950: Expansion and destruction
hierarchical_section_title: Ulm–Sigmaringen railway / History / 1890–1950: Expansion and destruction
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Bahnhof von de:Tuttlingen, gesehen von den Gleisen, Neubau von 1933, 1930er-Jahre-Stil. Baden-Württemberg, Deutschland.
context_page_description: The Ulm–Sigmaringen railway is a 92.670-kilometre-long railway in Baden-Württemberg in south-western Germany, which is largely single-tracked and for the most part not electrified. It runs from Ulm via Blaubeuren and Riedlingen to Sigmaringen mostly in the valley of the Danube. The line is part of the once important long-distance connection from Munich to Freiburg im Breisgau.
  It forms part of the Danube Valley Railway of Baden-Württemberg. The line is famous especially for its charming course through the Upper Danube Nature Park, and is particularly attractive to bicycle tourists. The Royal Württemberg State Railways built the line as part of the railway projects undertaken between 1865 and 1873. Since 1901, the Danube Valley Railway, together with the Höllentalbahn, form part of the pan-regional railway link from Ulm to Freiburg im Breisgau.
context_section_description: The high expectations, which the military had placed in the Danube Valley Railway in connection with the other railways in the southwest of Germany, were not met in either World War I or World War II.  Up until World War I, there were just a few efforts at expanding the Danube Valley Railway from the single-track formation it had featured since 1890.  In 1912, the connection to the new shunting yard for the city of Ulm, which was located in Söflingen, was expanded by the Royal Württemberg State Railways to twin tracks on the 3-kilometre-long section between Söflingen and Ulm Hauptbahnhof.  By 1913, twin tracks had been laid to Herrlingen.  Also prior to World War I, the state of Württemberg had planned to expand the section between Tuttlingen and Immendingen, which was also used by long-distance trains on the Stuttgart–Hattingen railway, to feature twin tracks.  The advent of World War I put a stop to these plans, and the plans were then cancelled in favour of the construction of a new railway between Tuttlingen and Hattingen in Baden, which had trains from the Gäubahn running on it, starting in 1934.  The section of the Danube Valley Railway between Tuttlingen and Immendingen therefore saw much less traffic, and has been kept as a single-track rail line to today.  The expansion of the Schwarzwaldbahn (Baden) to feature twin tracks, which was completed in 1921, had the side effect of expanding the westerly section of the Danube Valley Railway, between Immendingen and Donaueschingen, to feature twin tracks soon after the end of World War I.
  Plans formulated by the Deutsche Reichsbahn for military reasons in 1937 to expand to twin tracks the section between Herrlingen and Immendingen, which had been entirely single-tracked, had strong proponents during the course of World War II, but were not further pursued after the end of the war.  After the completion of the Danube Valley Railway, the railway property around the railway node Ulm were expanded several times, namely between 1899 and 1911 by the Royal Württemberg State Railways, and between 1924 and 1928 by the Deutsche Reichsbahn.  In Tuttlingen, which became a railway node with the completion of the section from Inzigkofen, the railway division Stuttgart (Reichsbahndirektion Stuttgart) replaced the entire station and property between 1928 and 1933 with new construction.
  The completion of the Höllentalbahn from Donaueschingen to Freiburg in 1901 made possible for the first time a direct connection between Ulm and Freiburg, something that had been under discussion since the 1850s.  Starting in 1909, express trains were used to make this trip, which, starting in 1912, sometimes continued on to Colmar in the Alsace region.  From 1913, express service was also provided from Munich via the Donautalbahn to Freiburg, which sometimes featured trains with a dining car.  The average speed on the line, notwithstanding the use in long-distance connections, remained rather low, at under 50 km/h.  With the exception of a few service issues during the two wars, service provided by express trains and local service trains, which stopped at every station and halt on the line, remained stable until 1945.  This service was initially largely provided by the steam locomotives of the Württemberg C class, which were heavily used to the mid-1920s, but were then replaced by the Bavarian class P 3/5 H locomotives.  After 1929, until the end of World War II, the modern engines of the class DRG Class 24 saw service.  Freight service was of little significance on the Danube Valley Railway due to the lack of industrialization along the route.
  Towards the end of World War II, Allied air strikes reached the cities and towns along the railway.  In December 1944, Allied bomber squadrons completely destroyed Ulm Hauptbahnhof, as well as the nearby shunting yard at Söflingen.  Heavy damage was also caused during the course of 1944 at the stations in Mengen and Tuttlingen.  The railway itself escaped most harm, and was serviceable, with some limitations, throughout the war.  Heavy damage to the line was then
caption: The station in Tuttlingen, newly constructed in 1933
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