Biking to the Railway Museum Bochum in Dahlhausen

Thursday, 01 August 2024 00:00
Written by Portal Editor

We had already passed the Railway Museum in Bochum-Dahlhausen several times during our cycling excursions on the Ruhr Cycle Path, and now it was finally time to visit the museum.

From our current location, the campsite on the Ruhr Bridge, just over 2 kilometres away, the Railway Museum is also easy to reach on foot. The path leads over the Ruhr Bridge, then left towards Dahlhausen, back over the Ruhr on the old railway bridge, through the rail tunnel and immediately to the right is the Railway Museum.

A little history of the Railway Museum in Dahlhausen

More than 50 years ago, friends of the railway and industrial culture began collecting historic locomotives and wagons. The Bochum-Dahlhausen railway depot, which was almost completely closed at the time, offered railway enthusiasts the opportunity to preserve the growing vehicle fleet at the original historical location and to present it to the interested public.

The extent of the interest in railway history was once again demonstrated by the encounter with the Frenchman Benoit and his son from the Le Mans area, who visited the museum because the son really wants to become a diesel locomotive driver.

Even in modern France with TGV and similar express trains, there are still a number of diesel locomotives for freight transport, the use of which had such a fascinating effect on him that, in order to get to know the past era of steam locomotives, Benoit made it possible for his son to travel over 1,000 kilometres and learn as much about railway history as possible.

We had already noticed during the tour how interested both of them were in all the technical details. During the conversation, the son then told us that the two of them had previously been to the model railway in Hamburg.

When we later told them about the model railway in Wiehe, their curiosity was aroused again, so we hope to one day be able to welcome Benoit and his son (with the whole family, of course) to Saxony-Anhalt. But now back to the museum. In the past, up to 450 people worked day and night to keep the Ruhr region moving by rail.

This movement was ensured by the railway, and so the Bochum Railway Museum today displays vehicles from over 120 years of railway history. Unfortunately, the completely misguided transport policy of the last 25 years has contributed to the fact that rail transport is now so poorly organized and the rail network so completely outdated that there are constant delays that are given flimsy excuses and even lead to German trains being refused entry to Switzerland due to their unpunctuality.

"Thank you for that" to the transport policy of the last 25 years. In fact, we were once further ahead in terms of rail transport policy, as the photographed sign clearly shows! But more on that later.

The Bochum-Dahlhausen Railway Museum today

From its founding and to this day, the Railway Museum has been a lively place of volunteer work. With a lot of passion and commitment, around one hundred volunteers maintain systems and vehicles, gaining valuable knowledge for the operation of historical technology that may one day be needed again. Until now, industrial and railway history was still hands-on, but thanks to energy, environmental and future technology, there is a lot of potential that can be tapped into and revitalized.

A workshop is also offered twice a year, and anyone who would like to be actively involved in museum work is recommended to take part in the "workshop" free of charge. You can work on vehicle restoration together with the experts. Other areas of activity besides the museum train include buildings, grounds, tracks and technical systems under expert guidance. The only condition is a minimum age of 16 years, and full board on both days with a communal dinner in a relaxed atmosphere is included.

Museum training site in Bochum-Dahlhausen

We were also very impressed by the museum training site, where trainees are supporting the renewal of the track system. Since the beginning of 2022, trainees from Eiffage Infra-Nordwest and Eiffage Infra-Rail have been working on the track systems of the railway museum in Bochum. This involves changing wooden sleepers, renovating concrete sleepers with plastic dowels, working on switches and renewing or repairing edge and shunting paths. At normal large construction sites, such a deployment is hardly possible due to the tight project time windows. Here, however, Eiffage trainees from the 1st to 3rd year of training can learn how to correctly replace, repair and tamper tracks without any time pressure and with the help of their training supervisor.

The museum also benefits from the cooperation, of course, as it supports the maintenance of the tracks and all work is carried out professionally.

This means that the historic trains can roll over the repaired track system on the site.

If anyone is interested in the practical seminars or even working at the Bochum Railway Museum, please use the following contact address: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

In further articles we will introduce some of the locomotives on display.

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