Passau Hauptbahnhof



Passau Hauptbahnhof is the main railway station at Passau in Bavaria, Germany. Built in 1860, it has eight platforms, of which three are bay platforms and three are through tracks. The ca. 130 m long station building is built in the classic style.

Present-day services
Today the station is a stop for ICE and IC long-distance trains, as well as local trains operated by Deutsche Bahn (DB AG) and the Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB). From Passau, regional services run to Munich, Regensburg and on the Rottalbahn to Mühldorf am Inn and the Austrian Western Railway to Wels and Linz.

Because Passau was on the trunk route (Magistrale) from Frankfurt am Main via Nuremberg and Linz to Vienna, many long-distance trains transited through it, such as the Ostende to Vienna Express (since the early 20th century) or the TEE Prinz Eugen between Hamburg and Vienna (since the 1960s), which gave its name later to the equivalent IC and then ICE trains.

Former railway lines
From the Hauptbahnhof in Passau two railway lines branch off that have since been closed. The Ilztalbahn to Waldkirchen and Freyung, with its former branch into the Czech Republic and to Eging am See and Deggendorf, and the line to Hauzenberg with its branch to Obernzell, that ran as far as Wegscheid in former times. These routes, which had not been worked by timetabled services for 25 years, were used until 2002 by the Passauer Eisenbahnfreunde (Passau Railway Society) for special trains, as well as by the goods trains of various companies. After 2002 the routes became impassable due to flood damage. Meanwhile, societies have been formed to support the lines to Freyung and Hauzenberg and they hope to reactivate these routes.

Former track layout
West of the main passenger terminal on the site of the former marshalling yard is a large freight station that serves the cross-border goods traffic between Germany and Austria as well as the cross-loading of goods to ships that ply the river Danube. To the east, the remaining storage sidings and locomotive shed were dismantled in order to create the "new centre of Passau" Neue Mitte Passau.

Station rebuilding
It was planned to convert the station to a barrier-free zone from 2008 to mid-2011 with a subsidy from the Free State of Bavaria of €2M towards the overall cost of €12.5M. The two island platforms as well as the home platform were to have been reached by a lift, and platforms 5 and 6 over the so-called Poststeg ("post office walkway") which would have considerably shortened the distance to the Central Bus Station in the new centre of Passau. In addition the home platform was to have been raised by about 76 cm and the underpass widened.

These plans were however changed during the course of 2008, because they would not have coped with the very high number of tourists at the station, especially those using the Danube crossings.

Joint DB/ÖBB use
Since 1951 the station has been used by the ÖBB and DB jointly as an internal station. For that reason there were two separate pedestrian underpasses under the tracks, separated by a wall, that enabled border and customs checks to be carried out. Since the entry of Austria into the EU in 1995 and the associated scrapping of these checks, this wall has been removed apart from a small section. On this section of wall there is a memorial tablet for the two policemen, Klaus März and Georg Schachner, who were murdered on 11 November 1993 in an Intercity from Linz to Passau near Schärding.

Above the tracks since 1975 stands the first "bridge post office" in Germany.

Train services
The station is served by the following services:

Bus services
There are also several long-distance bus-services that go via Passau Hbf.