Vogelfluglinie
The Vogelfluglinie (German) or Fugleflugtslinien (Danish) is a transport corridor between Copenhagen, Denmark, and Hamburg, Germany.
Apart from the Danish and German name meaning bee line (litterally: bird flight line), the corridor is also an important bird migration line between arctic Scandinavia and Central Europe.
Ferry link
The core of the connection is the 19 km ferry link between Rødby (Denmark) and Puttgarden (Germany). The line is operated by the jointly Danish and German state-owned Scandlines. Ferries take 45 minutes and operate twice an hour, 24 hours a day. The ships act as car and train ferry simultanuously.
The projected Fehmarn Belt bridge would replace the ferries. Danish-German negotiations will decide the fate of the plans by 1 July, 2007.
Landside connections
The road connection consists of:
- European route E 47 on the Danish side. By the end of 2007, the last few kilometers of two-lane road will be upgraded to motorway.
- Autobahn A1 (European routes E 47 and E22) on the German side, and the two-lane Bundesstraße 207/E 47 on the northernmost section. An additional 10 km of motorway will be completed by 2008, still rendering the last 25 km a two-lane road.
The rail connection consists of:
- 118 km of double track line from Copenhagen to Vordingborg (maximum speed 140 to 180 km/h; electrified for 64 km until Ringsted)
- 65 km of single track line from Vordingborg to Rødby (maximum speed 120 km/h)
- 89 km of single track line from Puttgarden to Lübeck
- 64 km of double track line from Lübeck to Hamburg, with electrification underway
Passenger services between Copenhagen and Hamburg number three to five EuroCitys a day in each direction, operated with IC3 trains. Since completion of the Great Belt Bridge freight trains are not directed via Rødby-Puttgarden any more, but via Funen and Jutland which is 160 km longer. Same applies to the EuroNight train between Copenhagen and Munich/Dortmund/Basle.
These current bridges and tunnels are part of the connection:
- Masnedsund Bridge, Denmark (rail)
- Storstrøm Bridge, Denmark (rail)
- Frederick IX Bridge, Denmark (rail)
- Farø Bridges, Denmark (motorway)
- Guldborgsund Tunnel, Denmark (two-lane road, being upgraded to four-lane)
- Fehmarn Sound Bridge, Germany (two-lane road and rail)
History
The connection was completed in 1963. Formerly traffic between Copenhagen and Hamburg would either be directed over the Great Belt ferry, Funen and Jutland or the Gedser-Warnemünde ferry. Proposals for a more direct "bird flight line" date back from the 1920s. Construction was started on the Danish side in 1941 after the Nazi occupation force pushed the matter, but work was halted again in 1943 because of the war.
After World War II Warnemünde ended up on in Eastern Germany and became inconvenient for traffic between Denmark and Western Germany. Construction of the "bird fly line" was restarted in 1949. From 1951 to 1963 a ferry line from Gedser to Großenbrode operated as a temporary solution.