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Stuttgart main station construction site: “Schedule situation is very tense”
Photo: Bernd Weißbrod / dpa
Lots of space for living and working on the existing huge track areas: This is what the people behind the billion-dollar Stuttgart 21 project advertised. But it will now take longer than planned for this to happen. Deutsche Bahn wants to continue to operate the current terminus station in 2026 instead of shutting it down at the end of 2025.
There are problems with the digitization of the new rail infrastructure in and around Stuttgart. “The scheduling situation is very tense,” said infrastructure director Berthold Huber, confirming a SPIEGEL report from the beginning of March.
The timetable for 2026 will therefore be developed “on the basis of the old infrastructure with the existing terminal station,” the state-owned company said.
Costs are now eleven billion euros
However, Deutsche Bahn has so far stuck to the planned opening date of the new main station, which will be located underground in the future. “We are still aiming for December 2025 to put the future Stuttgart main station into operation,” said Huber. According to SPIEGEL information, the company is planning a kind of pseudo-commissioning.
In fact, according to Deutsche Bahn, some essential elements of Stuttgart 21 will not be put into operation until the end of 2026. Deutsche Bahn said it is “working hard to determine in detail the sequence in which the many different newly built infrastructure parts will go into operation, taking into account the available vehicle fleets.”
The railway now estimates the costs for Stuttgart 21 at around eleven billion euros. There have been significant cost increases several times in recent years. The commissioning of the project had also been repeatedly delayed. When the financing agreement was signed in 2009, plans called for an opening in 2019, according to Deutsche Bahn.
In addition to the construction of the new main train station in the Baden-Württemberg state capital, the Stuttgart 21 project includes a complete reorganization of the railway junction. New train stations are being built - such as a new long-distance train station at the airport - dozens of kilometers of railway tracks and tunnels, culverts and bridges.
The Stuttgart-Ulm rail project also includes the construction of the new Wendlingen-Ulm high-speed line, which will open in 2022. The heart of the new rail hub in Stuttgart will be the new underground main station, which, in contrast to the previous terminus station, will be a through station.
apr/dpa