WESTbahn

Austria’s first open-access challenger, running since 2011: 200 km/h Stadler KISS double-deckers that drove fares down on the Vienna–Salzburg run.

WESTbahn was Austria’s first private challenger on the rails, launching in 2011 with Swiss double-deck KISS sets, café counters on board and walk-up fares that forced ÖBB to sharpen its own. The green-and-white trains share Austria’s premier east–west line: out through the Tullnerfeld, past Melk where the great baroque abbey rides its bluff above the Danube, then the Alpine foreland lakes before Salzburg’s fortress closes the view. Between the two operators the corridor now sees a departure roughly every quarter-hour: the densest intercity service in the Alps.

Stations

1. 0 kmWien Westbahnhof
2. 6 kmWien Hütteldorf
3. 60 kmSt. Pölten Hauptbahnhof +5
4. 120 kmAmstetten +3
5. 182 kmLinz Hauptbahnhof +6
6. 207 kmWels Hauptbahnhof +3
7. 236 kmAttnang-Puchheim +2
8. 306 kmSalzburg Hauptbahnhof +6

The stations OpenStreetMap lists for this service, in order, with the distance along the line as drawn here. A train may skip some of them. A +N after a station: N other routes on this map stop or end there, and the map draws it as a station where lines meet.

Along the way

• Tullnerfeld sprint
• Melk abbey above the Danube
• Enns valley market towns
• Wallersee and the Alpine foreland
• Hohensalzburg fortress finale

How this line was checked

• Line drawn from OpenStreetMap relation 7576704: the same nodes OpenStreetMap holds for this railway, thinned to within under 25 m of them
• Checked against OpenStreetMap: 97.9% of this line lies within 250 m of real track (median 6 m); the longest stretch away from it is 6.5 km
• The operator publishes this line's timetable: WESTbahn, a place to look it up, not a check of our drawing
• Wikipedia has an article for this line
• See for yourself: open this line on the map with OpenStreetMap's own railway drawn underneath it

Questions and answers

How long is the WESTbahn?

The WESTbahn runs 315 km from Vienna to Salzburg.

How long does the WESTbahn take?

The fastest scheduled journey is 2 h 30 min for the 315 km. That is an average of 126 km/h end to end. The line's top service speed is 200 km/h.

Who runs the WESTbahn?

WESTbahn, with Stadler KISS double-decker.

How old is the WESTbahn?

The line has been in service since 2011. That is the year the atlas dates it from: for a modern brand running over an older railway, it is the railway's date, not the brand's.

How often does the WESTbahn run?

Hourly (up to half-hourly with ÖBB).

View on the world railway map →

Read more on Wikipedia ↗