PKP Rail Line 131
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The Coal Trunk-Line ( pl, Magistrala Węglowa) is one of the most important rail connections in Poland. It crosses the central part of the country, from the coal mines and steelworks of Upper Silesia in the South to the Baltic Sea port of Gdynia in the North. The line is used mostly by freight trains: passenger connections on it are few. Constructed in the late 1920s and early 1930s, it was one of the biggest investments of the
Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 1918 and 1939. The state was established on 6 November 1918, before the end of ...
.


Route

The Coal Trunk-Line starts at the station Chorzów Batory, in the Upper Silesian city of
Chorzów Chorzów ( ; ; german: link=no, Königshütte ; szl, Chorzōw) is a city in the Silesia region of southern Poland, near Katowice. Chorzów is one of the central cities of the Upper Silesian Metropolitan Union – a metropolis with a population ...
, heading north. After crossing almost 30 kilometers it reaches Tarnowskie Góry – a very important freight station located on the northern outskirts of the
Upper Silesian Coal Basin The Upper Silesian Coal Basin ( pl, Górnośląskie Zagłębie Węglowe, GZW, cs, Hornoslezská uhelná pánev) is a coal basin in Silesia, in Poland and the Czech Republic.Kalety and
Herby Nowe Herby Nowe is a railway station serving the town of Herby, located north of the Upper Silesian Industrial Area, along the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, in the Lubliniec County of the Silesian Voivodeship. By the station, which was opened in 1926, there ...
. In Herby , the Coal Trunk-Line proper begins. The connection Chorzów Batory – Kalety had been built before the 1920s, by the Germans, as these lands had belonged to Germany until 1921. Then, in 1926 a Kalety –
Herby Nowe Herby Nowe is a railway station serving the town of Herby, located north of the Upper Silesian Industrial Area, along the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, in the Lubliniec County of the Silesian Voivodeship. By the station, which was opened in 1926, there ...
– Wieluń – Kępno line was constructed, thanks to which Upper Silesia and Poznań got a direct connection, without the necessity of using the then-German junction at Kreuzburg (Kluczbork). From Herby , crossing the strategic junctions of
Chorzew Siemkowice Chorzew Siemkowice is a Polish rail junction located in the Pajęczno County of the Łódź Voivodeship, in central part of Poland. It is located on the route of the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, here the Trunk-Line is joined by the Częstochowa Częs ...
and Zduńska Wola Karsznice, the Coal Trunk-Line reaches Inowrocław. From there it goes to
Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz ( , , ; german: Bromberg) is a city in northern Poland, straddling the meeting of the River Vistula with its left-bank tributary, the Brda. With a city population of 339,053 as of December 2021 and an urban agglomeration with more ...
, which had already been connected to
Gdańsk Gdańsk ( , also ; ; csb, Gduńsk;Stefan Ramułt, ''Słownik języka pomorskiego, czyli kaszubskiego'', Kraków 1893, Gdańsk 2003, ISBN 83-87408-64-6. , Johann Georg Theodor Grässe, ''Orbis latinus oder Verzeichniss der lateinischen Benen ...
and Gdynia (via Laskowice and Tczew), but the creation of
Free City of Danzig The Free City of Danzig (german: Freie Stadt Danzig; pl, Wolne Miasto Gdańsk; csb, Wòlny Gard Gduńsk) was a city-state under the protection of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gda ...
made it difficult to keep regular Polish freight movement in the interbellum. Thus, another part of the Coal Trunk-Line between Bydgoszcz and Gdynia was constructed in the early 1930s, via
Wierzchucin Wierzchucin is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Cekcyn, within Tuchola County, Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-central Poland. It lies approximately south-east of Cekcyn, east of Tuchola, and north of Bydgoszcz ...
and Kościerzyna and the sparsely populated forests and hills of Kashubia. The Coal Trunk-Line ends in the Baltic Sea port of Gdynia, after crossing all of Poland from south to north (appr. 550 kilometers).


History


Beginnings and interwar period

In 1921–1922 the borders of the
Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 1918 and 1939. The state was established on 6 November 1918, before the end of ...
were finally established. Upper Silesia was divided (see: Silesian Uprisings) and the boundary left in German hands several crucial junctions, including Kluczbork (Kreuzburg) and
Fosowskie Fosowskie (german: Vossowska, 1936-45: ''Vosswalde''), also called ''Wosowska'' between 1945 and 1948, is a district of the southern Polish town of Kolonowskie, Strzelce County, Opole Voivodeship, located at the Mała Panew river. History Fosow ...
(Vossowska). Without these centers, rail communication between Polish Silesia and the Baltic Sea was virtually impossible. As coal was one of the main Polish exports, and transit through Germany was not allowed (due to the German–Polish customs war in the late 1920s and early 1930s), construction of the new line was necessary. On 17 February 1928 the President of Poland
Ignacy Mościcki Ignacy Mościcki (; 1 December 18672 October 1946) was a Polish chemist and politician who was the country's president from 1926 to 1939. He was the longest serving president in Polish history. Mościcki was the President of Poland when Germany ...
signed a bill which ordered the construction of the 255-kilometer line Herby – Inowrocław. For unknown reasons, the important industrial center of Łódź, located just a few kilometers east of the route, was not included in it. Instead, the Coal Trunk-Line crossed the main East-West route ( Warsaw – Łódź – Ostrów Wielkopolski – Poznań) in the vicinity of the town of
Zduńska Wola Zduńska Wola is a city in central Poland with 40,730 inhabitants (2021). It is the seat of Zduńska Wola County in the Łódź Voivodeship. The city was once one of the largest cloth, linen and cotton weaving centres in Poland and is the birt ...
. As a result, a huge nexus was built in Zduńska Wola-Karsznice, which until today is one of the most important junctions of the whole country. Also, a new settlement was built there, with several condominiums for rail workers and their families. Apart from the line itself, numerous stations along the way were built. Most of them resemble traditional Polish manor houses, with very interesting architecture. The Herby – Karsznice connection was completed by 1930, soon afterwards the route reached Inowrocław. As the line between Inowrocław and Bydgoszcz already existed, the next step was the construction of the last part – from Bydgoszcz to Gdynia, through the Polish Corridor, without entering the territory of the
Free City of Danzig The Free City of Danzig (german: Freie Stadt Danzig; pl, Wolne Miasto Gdańsk; csb, Wòlny Gard Gduńsk) was a city-state under the protection of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gda ...
. The whole Coal Trunk-Line was completed by 1933, and in 1939 it was connected with
Częstochowa Częstochowa ( , ; german: Tschenstochau, Czenstochau; la, Czanstochova) is a city in southern Poland on the Warta River with 214,342 inhabitants, making it the thirteenth-largest city in Poland. It is situated in the Silesian Voivodeship (admin ...
, due to the
Chorzew Siemkowice Chorzew Siemkowice is a Polish rail junction located in the Pajęczno County of the Łódź Voivodeship, in central part of Poland. It is located on the route of the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, here the Trunk-Line is joined by the Częstochowa Częs ...
– Częstochowa route, which was finished on 23 April 1939. Also, on the same day, the second track was completed on the sector between Zduńska Wola Karsznice and Chorzew Siemkowice. Among the guests, invited for a celebration of the opening of the Częstochowa – Siemkowice connection, were the Polish minister of transportation, Juliusz Ulrich and the minister of public works of France, Anatole de Monzie. Between the wars, long-distance passenger trains still used the Bydgoszcz – Danzig – Gdynia connection, crossing the territory of the Free City of Danzig.


Second World War and afterwards

During the Second World War German occupiers did not regard the Coal Trunk-Line as a strategic one. For them, the West – East routes were most important, along which military transports were carried. Besides, since the pre-1939 borders were voided, part of the line between Bydgoszcz and Gdynia was replaced by the Bydgoszcz – Tczew – Danzig – Gdynia connection. In spite of this, in the early 1940s, the Germans laid a second track on the routes Herby – Siemkowice (55 km) and Karsznice – Inowrocław (156 km). After the war, the Coal Trunk-Line again gained importance. Transports of Silesian coal to Gdansk and Gdynia were crucial for the Polish economy, so by 1966 electrification of the whole route was completed. However, the original connection Bydgoszcz – Kościerzyna – Gdynia was abandoned by freight trains which go on the route Bydgoszcz – Tczew – Gdansk – Gdynia, and today is used only by local traffic. Today, the Coal Trunk-Line is one of the most prosperous rail routes in Poland. Passenger trains are few (many passenger trains on Tczew - Inowrocław part of this line), but freight trains are very numerous, as this is the fastest way from the industrial areas of Upper Silesia, Zagłębie Dąbrowskie and Częstochowa to the Baltic ports. The segment of the line from Bydgoszcz to Gdynia is today designated as PKP line 201, the segment from Chorzów to Bydgoszcz is part of PKP line 131 which diverges from Bydgoszcz towards Tczew.


Investor

The Coal Trunk-Line was constructed by order of the Polish Government by a private company, the French-Polish Rail Association (FPTK – Francusko-Polskie Towarzystwo Kolejowe). This company maintained the route Herby – Gdynia from 24 April 1931 until 1 September 1939. During that time, the line was not under the authority of the Polish State Railways (
PKP PKP may stand for: Organizations * Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas-1930, original Filipino communist party * Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas, underground Filipino Maoist party * Phi Kappa Phi, oldest all-discipline honor society in the United Stat ...
), the FPTK directed it from its headquarters in Bydgoszcz. After the war, the whole line was nationalized.


Main stations

The most important stations on the original route are
Chorzów Chorzów ( ; ; german: link=no, Königshütte ; szl, Chorzōw) is a city in the Silesia region of southern Poland, near Katowice. Chorzów is one of the central cities of the Upper Silesian Metropolitan Union – a metropolis with a population ...
, Tarnowskie Góry, Kalety,
Herby Nowe Herby Nowe is a railway station serving the town of Herby, located north of the Upper Silesian Industrial Area, along the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, in the Lubliniec County of the Silesian Voivodeship. By the station, which was opened in 1926, there ...
,
Chorzew Siemkowice Chorzew Siemkowice is a Polish rail junction located in the Pajęczno County of the Łódź Voivodeship, in central part of Poland. It is located on the route of the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, here the Trunk-Line is joined by the Częstochowa Częs ...
, Zduńska Wola Karsznice, Inowrocław,
Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz ( , , ; german: Bromberg) is a city in northern Poland, straddling the meeting of the River Vistula with its left-bank tributary, the Brda. With a city population of 339,053 as of December 2021 and an urban agglomeration with more ...
,
Wierzchucin Wierzchucin is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Cekcyn, within Tuchola County, Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-central Poland. It lies approximately south-east of Cekcyn, east of Tuchola, and north of Bydgoszcz ...
, Kościerzyna, Somonino and Gdynia.


Distances

The length of the line is measured from the junction at Herby to the port of Gdynia (e.g. from South to North). Not included is the connection Chorzów Batory – Herby (65 km.) *
Herby Nowe Herby Nowe is a railway station serving the town of Herby, located north of the Upper Silesian Industrial Area, along the Polish Coal Trunk-Line, in the Lubliniec County of the Silesian Voivodeship. By the station, which was opened in 1926, there ...
(0 km.), * Chorzew Siemkowice (55 km.), * Zduńska Wola Karsznice (99 km.), * Inowrocław Rabinek (247 km.), * Inowrocław Glowny (254 km.), * Bydgoszcz Glowna (299 km.), * Wierzchucin (347 km.), * Bąk (392 km.), * Kościerzyna (413 km.), * Somonino (438 km.), * Gdynia Glowna (480 km.).


Timeline

Dates of construction of the route: * Czersk – Bak – Kościerzyna – 1928, * Herby – Zduńska Wola – 1930, *
Maksymilianowo Maksymilianowo is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Osielsko, within Bydgoszcz County, Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-central Poland. It lies north-west of Osielsko and north of Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz ( , , ; ge ...
– Bąk – 1930, * Kościerzyna – Gdynia – 1930, * Zduńska Wola – Inowrocław – 1933, The total length of the connection constructed between 1930 and 1933 – 448 km.


References

* Maly rocznik statystyczny, Glowny Urzad Statystyczny RP, Warszawa 1939, * Urzedowy Rozklad Jazdy i Lotow Lato 1939, Wydawnictwo Ministerstwa Komunikacji, Warszawa 1939, * Polska 1939 – mapa samochodowa, Wydawnictwo PTR Kartografia, Warszawa 2005, * Mapa polskiej sieci kolejowej, wydawnictwo Ministerstwa Komunikacji w Warszawie, 1939.


External links


an interesting page about the line, with photographs and plenty of information
,
history of the line
{{in lang, pl,
gallery of photographs of the line
Second Polish Republic Railway lines in Poland