The Leipzig-Dresden railway line through time

The final stages of the downfall of the communist state witnessed the railways and the station in Leipzig becoming a focus for major demonstrations as thousands of Saxonians made their way to demonstrate against the oppressive system. Every Monday evening throughout the autumn of 1989, train loads of people came into Leipzig and demonstrations focused around the church of St Nicholai. The pastor, Friedrich Magirius became the champion for the Monday evening demonstrations. Many used the Leipzig -Dresden railway line to travel to the demonstrations from all over Saxony. A description by a doctor recounted:

"The first ones came about 4pm, most were young, some slightly drunk, they were beaten up in Dresden railway station by the transport police and were found unconscious on the train."

"X arrived in the early afternoon at Leipzig station. On the way through the town centre she was arrested by the police and pushed into a truck on which there were already other people. They were then all locked in a dark stable."

The weekly anti-communist demonstrations continued into 1990, with over 100,000 people taking to the streets in Leipzig. People, many holding candles, chanting "We are one people", "Reunification now", and "Germany is one" flowed into the six-lane road outside the station from towns and villages of Saxony. The protest had begun in Leipzig early in the 1980s', when small groups of church-goers had met at St Nikolai every Monday, and continued through the decade.

"We prayed here for months and in front of the doors were the Stasi (secret police), the police and troops. Since April 1988, on every Monday the police were waiting outside the door with trucks. All the streets to the Church would be closed off by chains of police. Nobody knew who would come safely home."

The governments of the two Germanies met in late 1989 and through 1990, to plan first for economic and monetary union, but very soon full political reunification was the main agenda. The East German state foundered, strikes, increasing debt, disintegration of local government and a continued haemorrhage of its population to the West. Industries, badly run, but sheltered from economic realities collapsed:

"The most pessimistic picture that is emerging for the period after privatisation is of an East German economy with its traditional core of heavy industry ripped out, leaving heavy pockets of unemployment and replaced by far less labour-intensive service industries. The balance of the economy for the last 45 years will change dramatically at the expense of industry and agriculture."

What the newspaper article went on to describe is vital for the future of Saxony and for the Leipzig - Dresden railway line:

"But it is not all unrelieved gloom for East Germany as unification nears. Its chief economic assets are a pool of highly skilled labour, land and Europe. Exporters have a head start in breaking into the developing consumer markets of Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and the USSR. Large numbers of well-trained craft workers, including plumbers, carpenters, car mechanics and upholsterers, are perhaps the most formidable economic weapons the east can wield."

This statement has distinct echoes of the early nineteenth century and the vision of List. The central position of this area of Germany was viewed as a keystone to the future economic development. Professor Walter at Deutsche Bank is quoted:

"[They] will help to fuel business around them and will turn Thuringia and Saxony (around Leipzig and Dresden) into the power-houses of the new Germany."

Any redevelopment or redirection of business would obviously need to take into account the Leipzig - Dresden railway line and the part it has to play not only in the Saxon economy but crucially in the all-German economy.

Within a year the East German state had completely collapsed and formal unification took place on 3 October 1990, one hundred and nineteen years after the first German state had been formed in Versailles. After 38 years the five Länder of Saxony, Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Pomeria were reunited into Germany. Saxony's capital, Dresden was said to be full of western investors.

"Hans Bauer, head of the German subsidiary of the US Helix Technology Corporation, took away a sheaf of print-outs giving details of ownership, employees, sector, and products. ``We're keen to invest in particular places and areas of activity, '' he said. ``This at least allows us to know who the contacts are and how we can reach them.'' But he said that the computer did not reveal key data on markets, turnover, quality of products, or their competitiveness. ``The markets must be in the west because there are virtually none left in the east.'' Attendance at the Leipzig Fair was virtually compulsory under Communist rule for firms wanting to do business in eastern Europe, but this year Soviet, Polish, and Czech exhibitors are largely non-existent because of the economic turndown. The fair, the oldest in the world with an uninterrupted 800-year history, is itself in the throes of painful adaptation to change and needs DM100 million a year support. At the weekend Jurgen Mollemann, the economics minister, promised financial support reportedly worth around DM50 million, plus talks on developing a new concept to enable it to compete with fairs in Hanover, Cologne, and Munich. He set out a vision of Leipzig being at the centre of new trans-European services bridging east and west. He urged a rapid decision on the proposed ``magnetic'' single-track rail system running from Berlin via Leipzig to Frankfurt, saying it would create up to 40,000 jobs and attract new industries and services to the area. Kurt Biedenkopf, Saxony's premier, added that talks were taking place with Polish and Czech officials to develop joint ventures in modernising and expanding the road and rail systems within this European region."

Since reunification, many millions of marks have been poured into the 'Neue Länder' as the railway system has been upgraded from its poor state. Little investment had been put into the infrastructure of the East German state, Saxony, the most heavily industrialised state was also the most polluted. 40% of the houses in Leipzig were built before 1914 and the extensive damage to both Leipzig and Dresden wrought by British and American bombers had created vast wastelands still there fifty years later. The railway line was still run on the standards of the thirties and little technological change had taken place. The huge station at Leipzig, the biggest in Europe was a symbol of a decaying line bereft of investment. The railway infrastructure, stripped by the Russians immediately after the war was many decades behind the railway system of West Germany. Although the railway line was extensively used by passengers, as cars were a luxury, unobtainable by the ordinary workers, it was a relic of a by gone time.

Extensive track and signalling work has begun to bring the line to the high standards of its western Länder counterparts as a new focus is sought for the reunified German system and an enlarged economic and political Europe. Many thousands of drivers working for the Deutsche Reichsbahn were sent to the 'west' for training. Many have stayed and are now working for the 'western' railway. Chancellor Kohl, the architect of the second unification in 1990 wrote about the importance of the railway in a united Germany:

"The railways within a short time enabled the people from east and west Germany to be brought together again. Those that know the situation within the Deutsche Bundesbahn and the Deutsche Reichsbahn will realise that a speedy fusion of both would not have been to the benefit of either but simply made existing problems worse. Where the DB must win business in the free market world the DR had a clearly defined state function/role. When the economic opportunities are auspicious the two will be brought together. It is for the 'bosses' in the DR and DB to amalgamate the two in terms of their organisational and technological structure. The DR must be overhauled from the ground up creating the opportunity to take account of market forces. The DR's rail network is appalling. To travel from Hamburg to Berlin requires twice as long as 50 years ago. We must redouble our efforts to improve this network. The creation of a fully developed infrastructure is one of the fundamental requirements of the development of a viable economy in the new Länder. The removal of trade barriers and borders in middle and eastern Europe will strongly encourage trade and transport growth. The railway must play a positive and very important role against this background, as one of the most environmentally friendly means of transport. In the new Länder, mobility is an expression of new found freedom. Increasing goods traffic will indicate an economic upturn."

The Chancellor saw an international high speed network (cross frontier) as irreversible and placed German developments firmly on a European setting and said the European future of the railway was just beginning. List and the other promoters of the Leipzig -Dresden line in the 1830s would have echoed those sentiments.

Treitschke, the foremost nineteenth century German historian wrote:

"In this peaceful contest she [Germany] was far ahead of all continental nations, with the sole exception of Belgium, ahead both of centralised France and wealthy Holland. It was the railways which first dragged the nation from its economic stagnation; they ended what the Zollverein had only begun; with such power did they break in upon all the old habits of life, that already in the [eighteen]forties the aspect of Germany was completely changed."

So that day in April 1839, when the first train steamed its way out of Dresdener station, Leipzig on the 117.2 kilometre rail journey to Dresden, was a major turning point in the history of Germany.