Continental lines prone to frequent disruption

[GordonT]

Recently in the UK there have been regular disruptive events on the ECML and WCML resulting from a variety of different causes such as adverse weather, infrastructure or traction failures and persons on the tracks. Are there any obvious specific lines in continental Europe afflicted with disruption to a similar degree?

 

[Flying Snail]

DB lines, all of them.

 

[NCT]

DB lines, all of them.

We can close the thread now!

 

[Segedunum]

Anything that goes through Köln Hbf up towards Düsseldorf feels like it enters some sort of black hole of delays every time I visit.

 

[The exile]

Anything that goes through Köln Hbf up towards Düsseldorf feels like it enters some sort of black hole of delays every time I visit.

Plenty of alternative options though (in terms of diversionary routes for trains or passengers)

 

[DanielB]

Though it appears to be going better now, the HSL Zuid in the Netherlands was prone to disruptions due to various design flaws. For example high winds resulted in line closures or speed restrictions on the southern section, as the designer-bridge over the Hollands Diep had no wind protection (but as it passes over a wide body of water, high winds from the wrong direction caused too much movement of the OHLE). Wind shields have now been installed however.
Another flaw is the voltage changeover for trains from Breda towards Rotterdam, which is located just before a high fly over. Thus, trains which hadn't got enough speed before switching voltage would come to a stop in the neutral section. Shortly after that changeover, there used to be phase separation resulting in another spot to get stranded for trains which hadn't picked up enough speed after the flyover. Though that one has now been moved.

And obviously the fact that a train from Breda to Amsterdam had to change voltage 4 times resulted in a lot of wear and tear.

 

[dutchflyer]

Plenty of alternative options though (in terms of diversionary routes for trains or passengers)

No, not really-f.e. look at what you Brits would have to go other way when coming off the EuroStar:€*, change into ICE in BRUssel on to FRAnkfurt, Köln/Cologne about impossible to avoid. Or early last week after a closure of a few days even for Duisburg-Düsseldorf due to some attempt to attack it.
But just 3-4 days ago my local RE Aachen-Köln was 3 min EARly into K, run by Nat.Express in red/white/blue, the colours of our (dutch) and your (British) flag and onward-by an RB also by Nat.Expr was just 3 mins late.
And it does seem that this area NRW (NordRhein Westfalen) and on this corridor is the worst off-spent a few days in old East-Germany, Leipzig/Thüringen area a few days just before that attempt and no real big disturbance noted on local trains-but some long-distance ICE passing by severely late running-but sticking to my DE-ticket would avoid those anyway

 

[fandroid]

Anything going in and out of Ljubljana at present seems to be subject to the dreaded RRB.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Aug 2025 ==

Having travelled a lot in Germany I have grown to expect to have to build in a lot of negative expectations about any long distance trains running to time.

However, a very recent trip from St. Pancras actually delivered us to Salzburg on time despite 3 planned connections involving DB. It didn't start well as the ICE that was supposed to start from Brussels Midi/Zuid actually started from Brussels Nord. However the Belgian railway staff were on top of it and (for those who were listening) directed us onto a local train that gave a cross-platform interchange at Nord.

 

[brooklynbound]

Bayonne - Hendaye.

 

[urbophile]

Lyon - Torino

 

[NCT]

Having travelled a lot in Germany I have grown to expect to have to build in a lot of negative expectations about any long distance trains running to time.

My rule for planning journeys in Germany is 'plan to arrive at dinner time and you should arrive by bed time'.

 

[paul_munich]

Problem of Cologne is less the station but the Hohenzollner-Bridge infront of it, the mother of all bottlenecks. It has six tracks only, two of them are for S-Bahns only, so all regional- and long-distance services to a city with one million inhabitants have to use just four tracks. And the worst thing is, that nearly all IC(E)s have to use it twice, everything coming from the south going to Düsseldorf is changing direction in Cologne. Wikipedia has a list of DB lines running over capacity. Wiki in German

 

[fandroid]

Problem of Cologne is less the station but the Hohenzollner-Bridge infront of it, the mother of all bottlenecks. It has six tracks only, two of them are for S-Bahns only, so all regional- and long-distance services to a city with one million inhabitants have to use just four tracks. And the worst thing is, that nearly all IC(E)s have to use it twice, everything coming from the south going to Düsseldorf is changing direction in Cologne. Wikipedia has a list of DB lines running over capacity. Wiki in German

Yes. You can see that the S-bahn tracks were bolted on to the north side of the station itself as an addition. Presumably the bridge is the same width as was rebuilt after WW2. North-south ICE trains can use Köln Messe/Deutz to bypass the Hbf reversal but the platform for that is really only up to S-bahn standards itself! (As are the station facilities)

 

[DanielB]

Arriving from the south via Köln Süd also avoids the bridge once when continueing to Düsseldorf, but takes a bit longer.
Is not usually done however, though my train to the Netherlands did yesterday because of a technical defect. (Probably it had an ATB failure in one cab and required to reverse in Köln prior to going towards Mönchengladbach > Venlo)

 

[U-Bahnfreund]

Karlsruhe-Basel is disrupted not all too infrequently (there are really a lot of trespassers around Emmendingen, also lots of construction around Rastatt, Müllheim and various maintenance works). The problem here is that there is no diversionary route, all trains just bunch at the point of no
return. Also the regional trains on the line (RE2, RE7, RB26, RB27) don't have enough capacity, both in terms of trains per hour and seats on the train, not helped by bad performance of the Siemens Desiro HC. Often RE7 trains which are diagrammed with two sets run with one set only, because there's too many broken ones. I don't get why it's such a problem, in NRW the same trains work just fine.

 

[jpl]

Adverse weather has caused some severe disruptions in Finland this summer. Our railways run mainly in forests so there are regular disruptions caused by trees blocking the line. Typically, when this happens, trains are delayed anywhere between two to eight hours as there usually isn't another route to go around. Another regular one is a thunderstorm causing damage to the signalling equipment.

 

[Bemined]

Problem of Cologne is less the station but the Hohenzollner-Bridge infront of it, the mother of all bottlenecks. It has six tracks only, two of them are for S-Bahns only, so all regional- and long-distance services to a city with one million inhabitants have to use just four tracks.

It's probably a combination of it all that is the bottleneck. If I look at the timetable I see about 72 trains per hour over that bridge, that is an average of 12 trains per track. That is not unusually high, the 4-track Schiphol tunnel in the Netherlands has to handle 56 trains per hour with plans to extend it to 72 trains after the ERTMS upgrade.

It can quickly become a bottleneck though when trains have to cross over between tracks without a flying junction. And looking at the layout of Messe/Deutz, that is exactly what is happening there though. The tracks from Siegburg/Bonn connect in the middle, so a train from Frankfurt reversing to Düsseldorf will most likely come in through the middle track but after reversing has to cross over to the outer track. If the junction at Messe/Deutz was better optimised the bridge will probably be less of a bottleneck.

 

[boiledbeans2]

DB lines, all of them.

Is this only a recent issue?

Pre-covid, I remember everyone was praising the German trains.

 

[RT4038]

Is this only a recent issue?

Pre-covid, I remember everyone was praising the German trains.

Late running of German Inter City trains has been a steadily worsening issue for at least the last 15 years.

 

[Austriantrain]

In Austria don‘t rely too much on connections from the Zurich/Bregenz/Munich - Vienna railjet express. They very often run 10 to 15 minutes late and are prone to longer delays, mostly because of running through Germany. Be especially careful about the Connection in Salzburg to Graz and Klagenfurt, because if you miss it, the next train is two hours later (from December 25 hourly though). Also be careful if you want to use them to Vienna Airport if you plan to catch a flight - leave lots of time.

Westbahn trains from Munich and Innsbruck are also affected by delays. Westbahn and ÖBB trains Running only between Vienna and Salzburg are usually bang on time.

ICE trains from Germany and trains coming from North of Munich are a lost cause, obviously, and trains proceeding from Budapest and Prague are often delayed as well - not by a lot, but again be careful about connections.

 

[NCT]

Is this only a recent issue?

Pre-covid, I remember everyone was praising the German trains.

Extremely limited anecdotal experience - I was in Cologne briefly in 2017 and then 2019 and about 50% of my long-distance and local journeys were 20 minutes late or more.

 

[The exile]

No, not really-f.e. look at what you Brits would have to go other way when coming off the EuroStar:€*, change into ICE in BRUssel on to FRAnkfurt, Köln/Cologne about impossible to avoid. Or early last week after a closure of a few days even for Duisburg-Düsseldorf due to some attempt to attack it.
But just 3-4 days ago my local RE Aachen-Köln was 3 min EARly into K, run by Nat.Express in red/white/blue, the colours of our (dutch) and your (British) flag and onward-by an RB also by Nat.Expr was just 3 mins late.
And it does seem that this area NRW (NordRhein Westfalen) and on this corridor is the worst off-spent a few days in old East-Germany, Leipzig/Thüringen area a few days just before that attempt and no real big disturbance noted on local trains-but some long-distance ICE passing by severely late running-but sticking to my DE-ticket would avoid those anyway

I’ll give you Koeln Hbf as a bottleneck, but straight off the top of my head the following alternatives to D’dorf - Duisburg come to mind:
Ratingen - Lintorf (OK this requires a service diversion as there’s no passenger service)
Neuss - Osterath - Krefeld
Neuss - M’gladbach - Krefeld
And at a pinch, once they’ve repaired it: Ratingen - Essen.
All mean delays of course but there are plenty of ways of “getting through” in an emergency.

 

[Mike99]

What an interesting thread this is, especially all the information about Koln Hauptbahnhof and the bridge, it's always enjoyable to just stand and watch the trains at that location.
It took me a while years ago to understand/realise that even though Dusseldorf is pretty much due north of Koln trains from the south cross the bridge and then reverse and head 'the wrong way' on departure.

 

[WessexEclectic]

Is this only a recent issue?

Pre-covid, I remember everyone was praising the German trains.

The following video was uploaded to YouTube in 2012 by a *German* musical group...

 

[paul_munich]

Is this only a recent issue?

Pre-covid, I remember everyone was praising the German trains.

No, it's a post-reunification issue. Years of underinvestment in the old states after the reunification and lack of money and man-power due to unprecedented investments in the five new states. But we see light at the end of the tunnel, I opened a thread in 12/24 about the General-renovation in the old states, the former FRG.
But overall 90% off all services are on time, it is not that you need a survial-kit if you take a train in Germany.

 

[43096]

But overall 90% off all services are on time, it is not that you need a survial-kit if you take a train in Germany.

Well, quite. The onboard environment is generally hugely better than it is Britain - particularly for long-distance trains. Any ICE set is a much better passenger experience than a Pendolino, Voyager or IET.

 

[paul_munich]

Well, quite. The onboard environment is generally hugely better than it is Britain - particularly for long-distance trains. Any ICE set is a much better passenger experience than a Pendolino, Voyager or IET.

And it's also significantly cheaper then in the UK...

 

[Bemined]

The line between Utrecht and 's-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands is trying hard to make it to this list it seems with 18 disruptions so far this month. The line has been suffering from stability issues due to outdated track foundations for years but recently it seems to be getting even worse.

 

[paul_munich]

When I was there last year, there were two temporary speed restrictions, not helping at all.
Are there plans to upgrade it to four tracks, as fare as I know it's part of the "an IC every ten minutes" plus Sprinters and freight trains...

 

[Bemined]

There are no plans to extend that line except for the short bit (just above 2km) between 's-Hertogenbosch and Vught junction that is currently being extended to 4 tracks (in combination with lowering the tracks through Vught to eliminate the level crossings over there).