Poland: When is a narrow-gauge line...?

[Calthrop]

A recent "the joke's on me" experience, in a short spell in Poland in late February this year. As a narrow-gauge-lover, I have been fairly assiduous over the years in seeking out as many as possible of Poland's at one time very plentiful n/g lines, to travel on. Few such lines are left in any kind of action today; and most of such as there are, already visited by me. A small but to me desirable n/g item which had long eluded me: the 3km stretch from Pleszew main-line station, some 75km south-east of Poznan, to Pleszew Miasto ("Town"). This minimal-length line -- a remnant of a once considerably longer route -- had for a long time been on a three-rail arrangement combining its original 750mm gauge, and standard gauge: with freight travelling on standard gauge, and the passenger service handled by narrow-gauge diesel railcars. This had been the case in the line's later years as a part of Polish State Railways; and after 2001, when the State relinquished the line to the firm SKPL, owners / operators of assorted Polish minor lines of both standard and narrow gauge.

On previous visits to Poland, I had wished to call in and travel on this tiny 750mm passenger survivor; but owing to one factor or another, it had never proved possible. SKPL suspended the line's passenger services early in the present decade, and I had imagined "that was that"; but a fairly recent discovery had been, their having reinstated them at an improved frequency, in I think 2015.

Interest thus, in seeking to travel over the Pleszew line last month. Confirmation of its being in passenger service, and facilitation of getting rail tickets to Pleszew (main line) and back again, were kindly provided by a local contact. I thus set off at 0942 from Wolsztyn, on the four-and-a-quarter-hour journey to Pleszew (an hour and a half's connection-waiting time at Poznan). Alighting at Pleszew main-line station I saw at roughly the expected point a couple of hundred yards away, a small red railmotor -- with a tight connection for its departure for Pleszew (Miasto), hastened to reach it and get on board: then became aware that the vehicle seemed oddly commodious and large-scale for a 750mm gauge railcar. As our conveyance moved off toward "Miasto", the truth dawned: it was a standard-gauge vehicle, running on the standard-gauge part of the three-rail track -- whose intermediate rail for the 750mm, could be seen out of the railmotor's front window as decidedly rusty. Plainly, SKPL have at some relatively recent time ceased to run narrow-gauge railcars on this section -- turning the passenger workings over to standard gauge, as had long been (as mentioned above) the case with the line's freight.

On arrival at Pleszew Miasto with its several sidings, as well as our four-wheel railbus running the service there were present there (all s/g of course), a two-car articulated diesel railmotor unit (painted grey), and two diesel locos -- one apparent Bo-Bo, one tiny. No visible sign of freight traffic; but that may still occur at times...? The large, two-storey station building was in course of some kind of extensive work on it -- heavily scaffolded and part-draped in tarpaulins. After twenty-five minutes, departure on the railbus's next working to the "main".

The line's present passenger service, as per timetables displayed in the railbus and at Pleszew Miasto station, comprises a round dozen workings each way per day, taking between eleven and fifteen minutes for the 3km run, which includes two tiny halts. On each of my journeys, the railbus conveyed a basic six passengers including myself, with some of those joining / leaving at halts on both runs. Later, back at the main-line station: the railbus appeared to take on board a decent number of passengers alighted from the southbound main-line service, calling at Pleszew just after 3 PM, which took me onward. About four and a half hours from Pleszew back to Wolsztyn, this time travelling via Ostrow Wlkp. (a bit over a hour's waiting time there) and Leszno.

So my envisaged probable last-ever Polish narrow-gauge line to "bag" (and genuine everyday commercial service -- not "preservation" or "tourist" -- into the bargain), turned out to have morphed into a totally standard-gauge operation: the only n/g vestiges being the out-of-use third rail; and isolatedly plinthed at Pleszew (Miasto), a cosmetically restored, un-numbered Px48 0-8-0 paired with a bogie van. Despite the disappointment gauge-wise, nonetheless IMO an interesting -- if extremely short-distance -- operation. and worth visiting: genuine-passenger "private lines" of any kind, are a rarity in Poland nowadays.

 

[Cowley]

Interesting stuff m, if a little disappointing from the point of getting the narrow gauge in the book.
It does sounds like an interesting little operation though, as do a lot of Polish lines.
I’ve yet to visit that part of the world because I suppose that if we do go abroad it’s always with the kids so we tend to head for warmer weather or mountains (blimey I love a good mountain).
Will get there someday though and having read some of what you and others on here have written about it the pull is definitely getting stronger...

 

[Calthrop]

Poland does have some fine mountains in its far south -- ranges shared with the Czech Republic and Slovakia, along Poland's borders with those countries. The big majority of the country is, though, low-lying for sure, and often very flat.

While I love Poland and its railways; have to admit that the rail scene there nowadays, is often rather saddening. There has been fearful carnage among local and rural passenger lines (the kind of railways I like most of all) in Poland over the past quarter-century-plus, in relation to the astonishing amount that there was still running as at the end of Communism -- though this has varied a bit, from region to region; some parts of the country harder-hit in this respect, than others. (Not much freight left on branch lines now, either.)

This is unavoidably the tendency nowadays, in the majority of the world. However, there do seem to be some countries of eastern Europe (Czech Republic, and Hungary, come to mind) where local passenger services have apparently so far survived in greater numbers, than in Poland.

 

[nanstallon]

Yes, there are few things sadder than revisiting a place, which a few years ago was fascinating and which now is in 'reduced circumstances'. I visited Smigiel in 2007 - railcar from Stara Bojanowo to Smigiel, meal in station buffet interrupted by arrival of diesel hauled freight which did a lot of shunting, then steam working on a couple of return trips to Stara Bojanowo, the steam loco having been hired for driving by an enthusiast but on public trains, finished the day with a railcar to the then end of the line at Wielechevo, and then a walk to Rakoniewice in hope of catching a standard gauge steam train. A brilliant day out. I came back in 2010 - the freight had finished, there was just the railcar doing a few runs to Stara Bojanowo and it was just a one man and a dog sort of operation.

 

[Calthrop]

The tale of the Smigiel 750mm gauge line in recent years, has indeed been a sad one. I learned recently from the "Wolsztyn Experience" folk, that although track throughout is still there -- extremely overgrown -- the line's stock is rotting away, with nothing happening or expected ever to happen again. A doleful situation here, not uncommon with narrow-gauge lines "turned adrift" by PKP, as it did with all its remaining narrow-gauge sections in 2001: local-government authority of respective areas supposedly got involved with supporting of local n/g line in continued operation, but this was essentially a scam: their real interest was expropriation (to build profitably on formerly-rail-occupied space) and / or exploitation -- including by demanding punitive local "rates and taxes" off those actually running the line. Effectively a death sentence for a number of lines.

A "might-have-been" which the Wolsztyn Experience bunch think about wistfully: at one time, the Smigiel n/g line ran the few kilometres beyond Wielichowo to Rakoniewice which you, nanstallon, walked -- making junction with the standard gauge at Rakoniewice. This short section was abandoned and lifted way back in 1973, in a "rationalising" move which no doubt was felt to make sense at the time. Fantasies triggered, re "if only this had not happened": the Wolsztyn system could have had an attached narrow-gauge portion, with Px48's having the free run thereof, and the n/g playing a part in the "Experience" on a regular basis -- plus various possibilities for specials with less-usual classes... However: for the vital section NOT to have been closed, PKP would have needed to own a medium-range crystal ball...

 

[Redonian]

I was at Smigiel a few days ago. It is simply not the case that nothing is happening and everything is rotting away. I am amazed the Wolsztyn Experience people should say this.
The railbuses and what I think is the remaining diesel loco are in the shed and clearly in good condition. The shed is being heated as was clear with the smoke from the shed chimney. The track in the station yard is in good condition and there are a number of recently relaid sleepers. The PX48 loco is outside opposite the station building. I doubt if it will steam again unless someone has a lot of money. There are a number of coaches and wagons with it in very good order and recently repainted. A notice on the station building gave the fares for 2017's trains which it appears ran on Bank Holidays and some Sundays in the summer. I am not sure of the extent of the running line for these trains. Probably not far. I also went to Stare Bojanowo Station. I doubt any trains on the narrow gauge have reached to there in some years and unlikely to again as the main line is being completely rebuilt and no attention is being paid to the narrow gauge at that point anyway.

 

[Calthrop]

"One stands corrected" -- the Wolsztyn Experience crowd seemingly don't after all, know everything there is to know about rail matters in Poland ! Nonetheless, a sad come-down from former times. I last visited the Smigiel line in 2010 -- no public workings at the time, but had the good luck to be able to travel on a chartered railcar run -- orgainised by the Wolsztyn Experience, as it happened -- from Smigiel to "Stare Bojanowo or thereabouts": it was around that time IRRC, that moves were being made towards truncating the n/g line some way short of the junction with the s/g.

 

[Redonian]

Indeed a shadow of its former self.
I suspect that the trains that now run operate from Smigiel to the station shortly before the PKP station at Stare Bojanowo where there is a run round.
It's some years since I looked at the line in the Wielichowo direction. Then it was all in place but receding into the long grass. I believe efforts have been made to restore the station at Wielichowo but getting a train to there seems unlikely.

 

[Calthrop]

I've travelled on the Smigiel line, only between Smigiel and Stare Bojanowo: twice, in 1993 and -- as in my post above -- in 2010. Travelled by car in 1993, alongside the largely roadside Smigiel -- Wielichowo section (time was short, and the next passenger working over that stretch was not due for hours) -- that section's track appeared to our eyes, mighty overgrown even then !

I recall -- from reading, not first-hand experience -- that decades ago, this must have been a grand little mini-system: what with its other "arm" which ran eastwards from Stare Bojanowo, 18 km. to a terminus at Krzywin. That part, I gather, withered away gradually, but lasted until relatively late, at least in part: by the 1980s, the passenger service had been cut back 6 km. to Zgliniec (freight east thereof, maybe lasting longer); I believe passenger SB -- Zgliniec finished in the early 1990s. There was also the interesting feature of the line's having been built and opened on the metre gauge; converted to the present 750mm, in PKP's late 1940s / early '50s campaign to "sub-standardise" its narrow-gauge sections, as far as possible, on 750mm.