In 1870, the Münster-Enschede Railway Company received a concession to build a line from Münster to Enschede. When it became insolvent in 1874, the
Royal Westphalian Railway Company (
Königlich-Westfälische Eisenbahn, KWE) took it over and continued its construction. On 30 September 1875, Burgsteinfurt station was opened together with the line. The
Wanne-Eickel–Hamburg railway of the
Cologne-Minden Railway Company was of high national importance and the
Rhenish Railway Company planned its
Duisburg–Quakenbrück railway to compete with it. Burgsteinfurt station became a junction station with the completion of this line on 1 July 1879. The Rhenish line crossed the KWE line south of Burgsteinfurt station. Finally the line from
Borken of the
Westfälische Landes-Eisenbahn (Westphalian Land Railway, WLE) was opened to Burgsteinfurt on 1 October 1902. As a result of the Second World War, operations on several sections came to a halt. Rheine station was completely destroyed in an air raid on 5 October 1944 and bridges were blown up in
Oberhausen and
Dorsten. Traffic across the Dutch border to
Enschede was closed from 1940 to 1951 and again from 1981 to 2001. On the WLE line to Borken, passenger services were restricted to only semi-fast trains after only 60 years of operations on 30 September 1962 and then stopped completely on 27 September 1975. The transport of freight between Steinfurt and
Ahaus had already been abandoned on 31 December 1972 and the line was immediately dismantled after the final closure of the line on 31 March 1988. After the closure of passenger services on the northern section of the Duisburg–Quakenbruck line from
Rheine on 31 May 1969 and on the section south of
Dorsten in 1960, operations also ended on the section between
Coesfeld and
Rheine on 28 September 1984. The transport of freight between
Horstmar and St. Arnold was abandoned in the mid-1980s. The line between Lutum and St. Arnold was officially closed on 1 January 1996, so that the station is no longer a railway junction. Freight operations at the station ended on 1 May 1996. As a result of a local government reform in North Rhine-Westphalia, the formerly independent towns of Steinfurt and Borghorst were merged as the town of Steinfurt on 1 January 1975, but the station was not renamed
Steinfurt-Burgsteinfurt until the timetable change on 12 December 2004. The dismantling of the Rhenish line between Steinfurt and St. Arnold started on 30 September 2005. Of the four former signal boxes, two have already been demolished, the
Bn signal box on the Rhenish line and the
Bmf signal box, which was located on the former middle platform. The two signal boxes on the Enschede line (the
Bf signal box to the south and the
Bw signal box to the north of the station) are still standing, but are out of service. Since 26 October 2008, signalling and points at the station have been remotely controlled from the electronic signalling centre at
Coesfeld (Westf) station. == Rail services ==