Loco-hauled services (diesel or electric) from Belgrade Central or Zagreb Glavni.

Just a shot in the dark. On Thursday my son and I are jetting out to Belgrade, and eventually Zagreb. We've a couple of spare days and were wondering if there are any remaining loco hauled services from either or both stations that are worth catching? There appears to be a station called Belgrade Dunav, which could have loco hauled services, but I've seen photos of the station and it appears overgrown and no longer in use. Can any of the subscribers out there offer some assistance?

The Old Belgrade ("waterfront") station in the centre closed in 2019 and all tracks have now been removed. The station building has been retained, but google street view (2024) shows it surrounded by hoardings. It is supposed to become a museum, but there is "confusion" over which museum.

There is a small railway museum in the basement of the railway offices at Nemanjina 6 near the old station (entrance off Hajduk Veljkov Venac).

The new main Belgrade Centar station is quite a way from the centre.

When I went in 2019 there there loco hauled trains operating out of Topcider station (near Tito's mauseleoum), but that is a long time ago now.

There is also a small railway museum at the back of Zagreb station. Google maps says it is "temporarily closed", but the museum web site says it is open Tuesdays 09:00-11:00.

As far as I'm aware the only remaining loco-hauled passenger train in Serbia (apart from the Optima Express which has no scheduled stops in Serbia) is the Lovcen sleeper train from Belgrade to Bar in Montenegro (which I definitely recommend if only for the scenery in Montenegro, one of Europe's most scenic railway journeys!).

From Zagreb there are more loco-hauled trains left, such as the international long-distance trains towards Slovenia, Austria and Hungary as well some domestic ones such as a daily loco-hauled train to Split. Do be aware that some Zagreb to Ljubljana trains are worked by Slovenian FLIRT EMUs though nowadays.

A great website to see planned train formations is https://www.vagonweb.cz/razeni/.

P Binnersley said:

The Old Belgrade ("waterfront") station in the centre closed in 2019 and all tracks have now been removed. The station building has been retained, but google street view (2024) shows it surrounded by hoardings. It is supposed to become a museum, but there is "confusion" over which museum.

There is a small railway museum in the basement of the railway offices at Nemanjina 6 near the old station (entrance off Hajduk Veljkov Venac).

The new main Belgrade Centar station is quite a way from the centre.

When I went in 2019 there there loco hauled trains operating out of Topcider station (near Tito's mauseleoum), but that is a long time ago now.

There is also a small railway museum at the back of Zagreb station. Google maps says it is "temporarily closed", but the museum web site says it is open Tuesdays 09:00-11:00.

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That’s Beograd Glavna Stanica, not Beograd Dunav. Dunav was near the Pancevo bridge and served trains towards Pancevo and Romania. I’m not actually quite sure why this was closed - certainly no “Belgrade Waterfront” up there!

Class15 said:

That’s Beograd Glavna Stanica, not Beograd Dunav. Dunav was near the Pancevo bridge and served trains towards Pancevo and Romania. I’m not actually quite sure why this was closed - certainly no “Belgrade Waterfront” up there!

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The counter argument is that it had to stay open while the old central station was open as that couldn’t be accessed from that direction ;IIRC). Now it makes more sense (for connectivity) to run everything into Centar, assuming that’s what they do. It’s not as if Dunav was the model of a modern railway terminal (yes, it does fit!), after all.

The exile said:

The counter argument is that it had to stay open while the old central station was open as that couldn’t be accessed from that direction ;IIRC). Now it makes more sense (for connectivity) to run everything into Centar, assuming that’s what they do. It’s not as if Dunav was the model of a modern railway terminal (yes, it does fit!), after all.

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Until about 2013, the daily train pair Beograd Glavna Stanica <> Bucureşti Nord usually ran via Dunav station. Departing Beograd the loco (on the buffer stop end of the train) would propel the train out of the station to where it could reverse and run via alongside the Sava river and via Dunav; personally I did this move on 9 October 2011. Similarly, in the reverse direction the loco propelled the train into the terminal station. It was reported that on occasion, when an electric loco was used, it used to propel all the way to Novi Beograd station then run via Beograd Centar.

For info there's a 2020 map of the Beograd area at https://www.egtre.info/wiki/File:Beograd_North.png (link to Beograd map on EGTRE / Enthusiast's Guide to Travelling the Railways of Europe)

I've visited Belgrade a few times, including just after the war, I've travelled from The main station and Dunav, but not yet "Centar"/Prokop (a more misnamed station...). What has happened is fairly typical to a lot of developments in this part of the world, and has been riddled with mismanagement and above all, corruption of the highest order. What the city and the country needs is some way distant from what has been effected.

The main station was closed to enable the Belgrade Waterfront development. Railway land and allied buildings needed to be cleared to allow brand new residential and commercial buildings to be developed. This was mainly financed by the UAE who did not want a working railway disturbing their luxury apartments and expensive luggage shops. So the station had to move. Various proposals to rededicate the station building to a railway museum, museum for Nikola Tesla, or a museum for Serbian history have come to naught.

The Wikipedia article on the station is fairly accurate - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Former_Belgrade_Main_railway_station

I think it would be fair to say that a number of the key players would have liked the station (if not the facade) to have been demolished in its entirety. The fabric of the building has deteriorated to a degree that demolition may be the only option. How convenient.

What always puzzles me is that an alternative option put forward against Prokop was the “Sava D” scheme, which would have meant putting building an underground station underneath the old station as a through station, and tunnelling up to Pancevacki Most. Why on earth this wasn’t chosen is beyond me. Prokop is dreadful and i often find myself taking a bus to Vukov Spomenik, an underground station in the city centre, to get a local train (which isn’t frequent) into Prokop to board another train.

Class15 said:

What always puzzles me is that an alternative option put forward against Prokop was the “Sava D” scheme, which would have meant putting building an underground station underneath the old station as a through station, and tunnelling up to Pancevacki Most. Why on earth this wasn’t chosen is beyond me. Prokop is dreadful and i often find myself taking a bus to Vukov Spomenik, an underground station in the city centre, to get a local train (which isn’t frequent) into Prokop to board another train.

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I would imagine that someone somewhere in the Serbian government or senior business circles would not have made enough money if it had been done that way. I believe Prokop/Centar is somewhat improved, but it's still in the middle of nowhere, as you say. The Lasta bus station was just around the corner from the main station, and now, of course, if you want to make a modal change, it's much, much worse.

Ignoring any dodgy backhanders, I guess that Beograd taxi drivers have benefitted from the move.

For info, my photos of a very incomplete Beograd Centar/Prokop station on a visit in October 2017 (link to my photo gallery website) https://www.steane.com/gallery/index.php?/category/189 . I'd first passed through Centar on trains in 2001 but had never previously explored the station area.

Paul AC said:

Ignoring any dodgy backhanders, I guess that Beograd taxi drivers have benefitted from the move.

For info, my photos of a very incomplete Beograd Centar/Prokop station on a visit in October 2017 (link to my photo gallery website) https://www.steane.com/gallery/index.php?/category/189 . I'd first passed through Centar on trains in 2001 but had never previously explored the station area.

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For a long period of time, at least one of Moscow's airports had no rail link because the Mayor was in the pocket of the mafiya, who controlled the taxi concessions there. So it's not beyond the realms of possibility...