Fun fact: the nice stairway down into the Markt station has actually already been there before. Ever since 1929 there has already been a great hall under the market square used during trade fairs, when every inch of space in the city was needed and they created that cool stairway as an entrance to that hall in that exact location. I love that they decided to keep them.
As usual, incredible video! Love to see these ones on specific topics. 5:14 I sometimes wish we went back to that era of not-so-well-done 3d renders. You could put imagination into them, and didn't have the huge expectations that modern renders put on projects (even if you are aware of it, human psicology plays a big role subconciously).
Reminds me a lot of the Center City tunnel in Philadelphia, opened in 1984 to connect the two historical suburban rail termini. The Philadelphia tunnel has four tracks rather than two but the Leipzig tunnel is 700m longer.
There was an almost equal planning for my hometown Dresden, about 100 kilometers east of Leipzig. If i'm not mistaken, the project was abandoned after the fall of the Berlin Wall because it was just not feasable to spend billions to have the S-Bahn running into a Tunnel to have two more Stations in the city center.
I definitely have to ask my cousin to give me a tour through the infrastructure. Him being the lead engineer means that he probably has a lot of interesting stories to tell.
Am from Leipzig. The coolest feature of the Hauptbahnhof-underground-station is that the collumns are blended with polished Jura-limestone. So everytime I get bored waiting for the train I look for fossils (mainly moluscs and amonites)
I think you should have pointed out that DB uses the Tunnel to redirect ICE trains in times of disruption! But great video nonetheless! Leipzig is a great city
2:26 only by floor space within the train hall. There are larger stations, with more platforms, more tracks, larger overall size of the station. Munich Central Station for example
@@cityforall I definetly am. Leipzig Central Station has 23 tracks, Munich has 38 (34 when not counting subway tracks). Munich's train hall and main building are roughly 350m long, in Leipzig they measure 300m in length. Including the platforms reaching out of the train hall, the station in Munich is 780m long, Leipzig is 530m
This new north-south rail link looks like a game changer for Leipzig that has transformed the town's commuter rail and intercity passenger trains! I'd say the billion euros was worth it. 😊
Great video! Thanks for showing sufficient schematic of old and new tunnels, maps, architectural highlights... Amazing use of glass blocks, much light, no ads (well marketeers, where your heads at, you surely could turn the tiles into pixels and run scrolling messages there... Not that you should...)
This is really nice. I remember the anticipation and that before this tunnel was opened, I guess it was two years prior (so in 2011) I took my chance on a "Backstage Tour" of the ongoing construction. They've even placed a few seats on a open cargo flat car and let us ride through the tunnel. So in 2011 was when I was first seeing these stations IRL. It still is a cool memory! Also btw: At the station Bayerischer Bahnhof there's a fun little detail that the lights are stationary, but begin to move when a train is arriving there. You can see it best at 11:42 in the video. Left side is stationary lights and right side, where the train is coming, they're moving like the train! It really is a cool detail that some people miss! With nice greetings from a former Leipzig citizen, ~ SaxonyELK
That's a nice memory. About the lights - I've noticed that, but thought it was a coincidence. If not that's really cool, such details make places interesting
@@cityforall They have built-in triggers in the tunnel to trigger the motion lights. Since it's just the turning on triggers, it is timed specific, so if there's a replacement train (in 2016 they've had run the music-making locomotive with double-decker coaches as replacement for the not yet finished new trains & back in the day they had ICE high speed trains run through the tunnel) or if the driver just slows down a little bit earlier, then they're not that synchronized. But in most cases it sells the illusion. I have to tell, for five years I was there daily, so I had plenty of time to look at it, plus I knew one of the drivers. :) Also btw: Just came across this channel, it was a cool video, about the history! :) And btw btw: I don't know, if posting links is possible here, but there are videos of the music-making locomotive, that did replacement services in 2016 through this tunnel. Also with the ICE services. I bet there are plenty of videos on UA-cam of it. Whoops, that turned out to be a long reply... 😅
Nice video, very well made. Thank you. I only spotted ony little factual error. Hauptbahnof did not exist before 1915 at all. There were several small and old stations, buit and operated by companies that served different connections. :) By the way, in Berlin their Hauptbahnhof only was built in 2006. Before, thete were no such thing.
Bayerischer Bahnhof used to be a very impressive, colossal building. Weird that the place is so underdeveloped now. The Markt station incorporates the historical features of the Untergrundmessehaus so organically. The Bayerischer Bahnhof could too.
Basically, the tunnel is very good. However, the traffic concept that was implemented with it is less so. Due to the changed traffic routing of the S-Bahn, the northeast and southwest of Leipzig are now completely cut off from the S-Bahn. In addition, a tram line that runs parallel to the south has been significantly reduced. A ring railway system is also not in sight, although Leipzig essentially has a freight railway ring. Parts of it are being converted into a skyway for pedestrians and cyclists. Overall, Leipzig is unfortunately still very car-centric and the tram network has been reduced rather than expanded. By the way, the station at the Bayerischer Bahnhof is a damned dump and the station at the market is a poorly designed structure. They forgot that the slats also need to be cleaned from time to time as fine dust accumulates on them. Scaffolding has to be erected for cleaning and the entire route is closed during this time.
To make space they apparently have taken up space of the westernmost two train tracks of the above ground Hauptbahnhof... Wonder if those could in the future need reinstating again
well there are the stairs/escalaters down to the tunnel where the platforms used to be. So if you really wanted to, you could only do shorter platforms that starts further out than all the others. You can also not just make it longer outwards, unless you want to rebuild the tracks to the next two platforms and the new entrances to the underground platforms again. And then there is the question what to use it for. Ideally by its location and it being short, you'd most easily connect it to the west-bound tracks that also lead to the tunnel, which are mostly used by S-Bahn. But that connection can already reach 4 tracks (the two lower ones in the tunnel and the next two tracks from the west) - which should be sufficient capacity for the S-Bahn needs. If you want to use platforms for other short regional trains, you'd have to grow out the already complicated jumble of switches in front of the station. All possible I guess, but I can see why they didn't. And given how many platforms the station has, probably wasn't a point in terms of capacity needs. If it ever becomes a problem, there's also the eastmost platform that could probably easier be reconnected. It's currently used as a small museum track within the station, show casing several historical trains. Which is also pretty awesome BTW, would be a shame to remove those.
It's impressive how engineers just keep pushing progress under totally different political regimes 💪 Btw - what happened with old tunnel on 7:02? Just ruined during WW2, sealed and forgotten?
Parts of the old tunnel were demolished when the Hauptbahnhof was reconstructed before 2000. The remaining parts including the entrance ramps were originally kept and sealed, in 2023 all remaining parts were filled with earthworks or concrete, so there's nothing left of them these days.
an optimistic, an pessimistic and an realistic person are in a tunnel, the first sees the light at the end of the tunnel, the second fears a train might coming, and the realistic one steps of the tracks.... an old joke, i once heard ...
Historically German cities favoured lightrail (tram) and suburban (S-Bahn) rail systems. The only cities that had metro systems build before 1914 (or even 1939) were Berlin and Hamburg. Some of their lines also were build as elevated lines, like in Chicago. Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, AND also Vienna only started to build metro system in the 1960/1970s. Leipzig was the 5th biggest city in Germany before WW2 (way bigger than Frankfurt). But it also was spacious and had a lot of lightrail already. Till 1990 - during GDR - this was also favoured, together with the S-Bahn.
Fun fact: the nice stairway down into the Markt station has actually already been there before. Ever since 1929 there has already been a great hall under the market square used during trade fairs, when every inch of space in the city was needed and they created that cool stairway as an entrance to that hall in that exact location. I love that they decided to keep them.
Wow, that's cool
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Untergrundmessehaus
danke für die info
€1 billion for all of that?! It's a bargain, money well spent and amazing that so much was achieved with that amount spent.
Yeah, when you consider that the cost of a similar project in New York is over 4 billion dollars
Ten years ago it was a huge discussion, why it got so expensive. But i think two, that it was a good invest.
@@robertk9173 compared to lots of other examples the price here looks quite reasonable
Great video! You forgot to mention the construction of "Leipzig MDR" station, which is an above ground station that was part of the same project
Yep, that's the part I missed. But it's not in the tunnel :)
great video, the tunnel looks really neat especially the Markplatz station. Also loved the bloopers at the end😄
I was in Leipzig past summer. I took the train trough this tunnel just because these stations are so amazing
FYI currently a study is happening to check the viability if a second tunnel from east to west, which would be way longer.
Wow, interesting video. I've been there before, but didn't realise, what an incredible project it was. Thank you for educating me
A Video about MY City? I was there on the day it opend!
A wonderful story, and video; thank you!
I've been to Leipzig a few times, but not since this was finished, so I must go back now. 😁
Glad you liked it!
As usual, incredible video! Love to see these ones on specific topics.
5:14 I sometimes wish we went back to that era of not-so-well-done 3d renders. You could put imagination into them, and didn't have the huge expectations that modern renders put on projects (even if you are aware of it, human psicology plays a big role subconciously).
Thanks a lot! I'll try to make more videos like this
Long format of videos.😊 Thanks for work!
@@ОлександрКотловий Thanks!
Reminds me a lot of the Center City tunnel in Philadelphia, opened in 1984 to connect the two historical suburban rail termini. The Philadelphia tunnel has four tracks rather than two but the Leipzig tunnel is 700m longer.
Moving the station arch was an amazing feat of engineering.
There was an almost equal planning for my hometown Dresden, about 100 kilometers east of Leipzig. If i'm not mistaken, the project was abandoned after the fall of the Berlin Wall because it was just not feasable to spend billions to have the S-Bahn running into a Tunnel to have two more Stations in the city center.
Beautifully done video. I would like to visit this city one day.
You definitely should!
I definitely have to ask my cousin to give me a tour through the infrastructure. Him being the lead engineer means that he probably has a lot of interesting stories to tell.
Am from Leipzig. The coolest feature of the Hauptbahnhof-underground-station is that the collumns are blended with polished Jura-limestone. So everytime I get bored waiting for the train I look for fossils (mainly moluscs and amonites)
That's a cool detail 😎
Way nicer than the Warsaw city tunnel. I hope that's how it'll look after reconciliation
I think you should have pointed out that DB uses the Tunnel to redirect ICE trains in times of disruption! But great video nonetheless! Leipzig is a great city
Retiring this year, $82K biweekly, this video reminds me of my life in 2023, you have really inspired me in so many ways!!!!!💜
2:26 only by floor space within the train hall. There are larger stations, with more platforms, more tracks, larger overall size of the station. Munich Central Station for example
That's why I said about floor space. By the way Munich Hbf doesn't look bigger. Are you sure?
@@cityforall I definetly am. Leipzig Central Station has 23 tracks, Munich has 38 (34 when not counting subway tracks).
Munich's train hall and main building are roughly 350m long, in Leipzig they measure 300m in length. Including the platforms reaching out of the train hall, the station in Munich is 780m long, Leipzig is 530m
@@EnjoyFirefighting Not that I really want to argue, but I'm trying to measure a train station in Munich and I can't get such big numbers.
@cityforall I measured it on google maps. The platforms at the southern wing station stretch out the furthest
Nicely made! Damn, I wish I hadn't caught Covid. The videos turned out beautiful!
Looking forward for the further collabs :)
@cityforall of course! Whenever you need something in my close proximity :)
@@pettylein cool!
This new north-south rail link looks like a game changer for Leipzig that has transformed the town's commuter rail and intercity passenger trains! I'd say the billion euros was worth it. 😊
Please more videos like this!
This one is great! 👍🏻
Thanks! I'll try!
Great video! Thanks for showing sufficient schematic of old and new tunnels, maps, architectural highlights...
Amazing use of glass blocks, much light, no ads (well marketeers, where your heads at, you surely could turn the tiles into pixels and run scrolling messages there... Not that you should...)
Glad you enjoyed it!
Very cool looking stations! i hope you do more stuff about stations so i subscribed
This is really nice. I remember the anticipation and that before this tunnel was opened, I guess it was two years prior (so in 2011) I took my chance on a "Backstage Tour" of the ongoing construction. They've even placed a few seats on a open cargo flat car and let us ride through the tunnel. So in 2011 was when I was first seeing these stations IRL. It still is a cool memory!
Also btw: At the station Bayerischer Bahnhof there's a fun little detail that the lights are stationary, but begin to move when a train is arriving there. You can see it best at 11:42 in the video. Left side is stationary lights and right side, where the train is coming, they're moving like the train! It really is a cool detail that some people miss!
With nice greetings from a former Leipzig citizen,
~ SaxonyELK
That's a nice memory.
About the lights - I've noticed that, but thought it was a coincidence. If not that's really cool, such details make places interesting
@@cityforall They have built-in triggers in the tunnel to trigger the motion lights. Since it's just the turning on triggers, it is timed specific, so if there's a replacement train (in 2016 they've had run the music-making locomotive with double-decker coaches as replacement for the not yet finished new trains & back in the day they had ICE high speed trains run through the tunnel) or if the driver just slows down a little bit earlier, then they're not that synchronized. But in most cases it sells the illusion. I have to tell, for five years I was there daily, so I had plenty of time to look at it, plus I knew one of the drivers. :)
Also btw: Just came across this channel, it was a cool video, about the history! :)
And btw btw: I don't know, if posting links is possible here, but there are videos of the music-making locomotive, that did replacement services in 2016 through this tunnel. Also with the ICE services. I bet there are plenty of videos on UA-cam of it.
Whoops, that turned out to be a long reply... 😅
I'm glad you liked it! Stay here, there are more such historical videos on the channel and I think there will be more.
great job with producing this video! Would have been great if you got your hands on more footage of the old tunnel though
Great video! I'll be near Leipzig over the summer (maybe for a while). Excited to check this out!
You'll like it!
Nice video, very well made. Thank you. I only spotted ony little factual error. Hauptbahnof did not exist before 1915 at all. There were several small and old stations, buit and operated by companies that served different connections. :) By the way, in Berlin their Hauptbahnhof only was built in 2006. Before, thete were no such thing.
That's a good point, thanks. I'll keep that for the possible future video about the Leipzig hbf
Bayerischer Bahnhof used to be a very impressive, colossal building. Weird that the place is so underdeveloped now. The Markt station incorporates the historical features of the Untergrundmessehaus so organically. The Bayerischer Bahnhof could too.
Interesting video. You could also do the same with Lodz where the same kind of project is going on for decades.
Always enjoy your videos, tapadh leibh :)
@@Fraslet thanks! Glad to hear that!
great infrastructure 😊👍
It reminds me of the North-South connection in Brussels.
Just wanted to say that the Network you show at 11:20 is not the nowadays Network
The one you are showing is the future plan for December 2026
Is this just a two-track S -Ban line? It is very impressive, but do mainline trains use it as well?
Basically, the tunnel is very good. However, the traffic concept that was implemented with it is less so. Due to the changed traffic routing of the S-Bahn, the northeast and southwest of Leipzig are now completely cut off from the S-Bahn. In addition, a tram line that runs parallel to the south has been significantly reduced. A ring railway system is also not in sight, although Leipzig essentially has a freight railway ring. Parts of it are being converted into a skyway for pedestrians and cyclists.
Overall, Leipzig is unfortunately still very car-centric and the tram network has been reduced rather than expanded.
By the way, the station at the Bayerischer Bahnhof is a damned dump and the station at the market is a poorly designed structure. They forgot that the slats also need to be cleaned from time to time as fine dust accumulates on them. Scaffolding has to be erected for cleaning and the entire route is closed during this time.
5:55 Moving the ark of Bayerischer Bahnhof was done by the Dodge company? Please expound
Dutch, not Dodge
To make space they apparently have taken up space of the westernmost two train tracks of the above ground Hauptbahnhof... Wonder if those could in the future need reinstating again
well there are the stairs/escalaters down to the tunnel where the platforms used to be. So if you really wanted to, you could only do shorter platforms that starts further out than all the others. You can also not just make it longer outwards, unless you want to rebuild the tracks to the next two platforms and the new entrances to the underground platforms again. And then there is the question what to use it for. Ideally by its location and it being short, you'd most easily connect it to the west-bound tracks that also lead to the tunnel, which are mostly used by S-Bahn. But that connection can already reach 4 tracks (the two lower ones in the tunnel and the next two tracks from the west) - which should be sufficient capacity for the S-Bahn needs. If you want to use platforms for other short regional trains, you'd have to grow out the already complicated jumble of switches in front of the station. All possible I guess, but I can see why they didn't. And given how many platforms the station has, probably wasn't a point in terms of capacity needs. If it ever becomes a problem, there's also the eastmost platform that could probably easier be reconnected. It's currently used as a small museum track within the station, show casing several historical trains. Which is also pretty awesome BTW, would be a shame to remove those.
First ever German TSW (Train Sim World) route
Great video!
@@BorIlovar thank you!
There are (were?) a few long distance trains through the tunnel, a bit like Frankfurt 21 (that never happened!)
It's impressive how engineers just keep pushing progress under totally different political regimes 💪
Btw - what happened with old tunnel on 7:02? Just ruined during WW2, sealed and forgotten?
Parts of the old tunnel were demolished when the Hauptbahnhof was reconstructed before 2000. The remaining parts including the entrance ramps were originally kept and sealed, in 2023 all remaining parts were filled with earthworks or concrete, so there's nothing left of them these days.
an optimistic, an pessimistic and an realistic person are in a tunnel, the first sees the light at the end of the tunnel, the second fears a train might coming, and the realistic one steps of the tracks....
an old joke, i once heard ...
I think there were quite good reasons for the Sbahn instead of an Metro, sadly cuz a metro would have been cooler ngl.
Historically German cities favoured lightrail (tram) and suburban (S-Bahn) rail systems.
The only cities that had metro systems build before 1914 (or even 1939) were Berlin and Hamburg.
Some of their lines also were build as elevated lines, like in Chicago.
Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, AND also Vienna only started to build metro system in the 1960/1970s.
Leipzig was the 5th biggest city in Germany before WW2 (way bigger than Frankfurt).
But it also was spacious and had a lot of lightrail already.
Till 1990 - during GDR - this was also favoured, together with the S-Bahn.
"normal" for Germany
But they finally finished it, so it's not that bad