The line was planned in the 1860s, though construction was not completed until the 1890s, and its purpose was at least partly
strategic, to allow a means for moving military supplies around the south of the Black Forest; the German Empire having seized
Alsace and
Lorraine from the French in the
Franco-Prussian War of
1870-71, a revenge attack in this area from the French or a preemptive strike to prevent one were key issues in German military thinking at the time. The normal commercial route along the
Rhine passed into Swiss territory so could not be used for military purposes. The southern section of the line, following the valley of the
Wutach from Waldshut-Tiengen to Weizen (part of the town of
Stühlingen), is relatively conventional. However, the middle section, from Weizen to
Blumberg, involved an approximately gain in height, and the military authorities specified that the line must not have a gradient of more than 1:100 since there was a need to move heavy military equipment. Accordingly, the line proceeds in a series of curves (including one complete circle), taking of track to travel a beeline distance of , with spectacular large viaducts, tunnels and bridges including the only spiral railway tunnel in Germany. The track is of standard gauge and is mainly single track; the bridges and tunnels were built on a scale to allow eventual doubling of the track, though this was never carried out. The final section, from Blumberg to meet the Black Forest Railway near
Geisingen, is again relatively conventional. The unconventional configuration of the track resulted in increased fares, as ticket prices were calculated on the distance travelled along the track. The line did indeed play a strategic role at various times in its history, and its most recent refurbishment (in the early 1960s) was carried out with
NATO funds, although in this case if the line had been used for military purposes the traffic would probably have been in the opposite direction. However, in the period after the
Second World War its commercial use declined, and, section by section, passenger service was withdrawn, though the southern section remained open for freight traffic until 2001. After the
Deutsche Bundesbahn withdrew passenger services on the central section in 1974, a voluntary organization was set up in 1976 to re-open it as a
museum line under steam traction, and it is now a popular tourist attraction. There have been a number of initiatives to re-open passenger services on the other sections of the line as part of a regional transport strategy, and since December 2004 the northern section has formed part of the
3rd Ring Railway () network of local railway lines ( service) in the south-eastern part of the
Black Forest, in the
districts of
Tuttlingen,
Rottweil and
Schwarzwald-Baar. The southern section was reopened and since January 2024 trains operate every two hours from to Weizen (). File:Ringzug Wutachtalbahn.jpg|A
Ringzug train in Kirchen File:Wutachtalbahn bei Epfenhofen.JPG|A
heritage train near Epfenhofen File:Zubringer in Stühlingen.JPG|RB 37 near Stühlingen ==References==