Steam locomotive "Waldbröl"



In 2010 the heraldic beast of the Berg county - the Berg lion - was revived. In co-operation with our colleagues from the Dieringhausen Railway Museum we operate tourist rides from the railway museum onto the Wiehltalbahn.
Draught horse of the "Bergischer Löwe" project is the steam locomotive "Waldbröl" of the Dieringhausen Railway Museum. It was built by the "Arnold Jung Locomotive Works Ltd." in Jungenthal near Kirchen in the Sieg valley in 1914 for the local railway from Bielstein to Waldbröl (Oberbergische Verkehrs AG - OVAG). After 42 years stationary as a monument it was recommissioned in 2008 by the Dieringhausen Railway Museum. Active members of the railway museum refurbished it to a large extent in an in-house effort.

In Waldbröl the neighbouring stations of the federal railway and of the local railway met end-on and were linked  by a bridge. Raimund Wehner had worked at the federal railway station in Waldbröl for decades and reported that up to the ‘50s freight wagons from or to the big, wide world were exchanged between the local railway and the federal railway at Bielstein. In the ‘50s this changed and wagons were exchanged at Waldbröl. Freight trains started to return the empty wagons from the paper mills to  DB in the morning to cut down on lease costs. This way the locomotives of the local railway  came directly into the federal station at Waldbröl. It is quite likely that  "Waldbröl" had often stood on exactly those same rails that she uses today with the "Bergischer Löwe".
In her first life she served the local railway from Bielstein to Waldbröl from its opening in 1915 until its suspension in 1966. As was usual for local railways, she at first hauled both  freight and passenger trains but in the ‘30s the local railway obtained several Diesel railcars so after that  "Waldbröl"  was deployed  solely for freight trains.

She was lucky to be displayed as a monument locomotive in front of the tavern "Parkschlößchen" in Nümbrecht instead of being scrapped like her sister engine "Bielstein". In the ‘80s the long-time Wiehltalbahn locomotive driver Dirk Wilkesmann bought her with the money he had originally saved for his driver’s licence and transferred it from the pedestal to the Dieringhausen Railway Museum. The active members of the museum refurbished the locomotive in countless working hours and on the 24th of September 2008 she was fired up for the first time in more than 40 years to steam off onto the Wiehl Valley Railway.

The „Waldbröl“ even has its own website.

It hauls the so-called "thunderboxes", which are basically 4-wheeled passenger coaches with open platforms at each end.

Source: www.kleinbahn-bielstein-waldbroel.de.