Ammersee Railway Partially Reopened

The Ammersee Railway Line major project has reached an important milestone with the commissioning of the first section. Over the next seven weeks, our team will continue working at full speed on three additional construction sections.

Following the final work on the signaling and control systems (S&C) and test runs, the trains are running again. On Monday, October 13, 2025, service on construction-section (CS) 4 from Dießen toward Weilheim resumed. This section was contractually scheduled to reopen first in order to offer relief to passengers who had been relying on rail replacement bus services. The buses had to take a long detour around the moorland, whereas the railway line runs directly through the marshy terrain.

Correspondingly, the challenges faced by our Buchloe branch, who are responsible for the extensive track renewal works, have been significant. In areas where Lake Ammersee once existed, the ground proved to be extremely soft, and the formation level was non-load bearing. It needed to be completely replaced over sever hundred meters. Our formation rehabilitation and cleaning machine, Katharina the Great, was in operation on the Ammersee line across all construction sections until October 12. It had to bypass particularly clay-heavy areas. These sections were renewed and will continue to be renewed in construction sections 1 to 3 until early December. Conventional construction methods, which involve substantial effort, will be used.

Overcoming Difficult Ground Conditions

Our colleagues from Buchloe faced the most severe soil challenges in the completed construction section 4. Even using a specialized milling machine which mixed lime and cement into the subsoil didn’t sufficiently help. Ultimately, the soil had to be completely replaced. The formation level was then stabilized using ballasts and geotextile. The challenging conditions were accepted and executed with excellence by the Ammersee project team. Our sincere thanks go to all crews from the Buchloe branch, the machine operators from the Track Construction Machinery division and the team from SPITZKE Schweißtechnik (Welding Technology) GmbH​ for their efforts.

Both the challenges and project progress were explained to people passing by and local residents by our Buchloe team. During the process, SPITZKE gained a very special supporter: on the western shore of Lake Ammersee, a seven-year-old became an enthusiastic SPITZKE fan and created a 2.5-meter-long artwork. What creativity!