- Trans Europ Express
The Trans Europ Express is a former international
train network inEurope .Origin
The TEE (Trans Europ Express) network was set up in
1957 following an idea of Ir. F.Q. den Hollander, president-director at that time of the Dutch railways company (NS). It was a network jointly operated by the railways ofWest Germany (DB), France (SNCF ), Switzerland (SBB-CFF-FFS ),Italy (FS ) and, of course, the Netherlands. Although some trains operated throughBelgium from the beginning, the railway company (NMBS/SNCB ) joined only in1964 .Luxembourg (CFL) also joined at a later date.Initially, the system was a completely diesel network. Because of the many different kinds of electrical specifications (voltages and current types -
alternating current anddirect current ) used in the different countries it was thought at that time that this would greatly speed up border crossing.Moreover, at that time many border crossing sections were not yet electrified. In
1961 with the introduction of the Swiss trainsets that accepted 4 kinds of current this principle was abandoned.Trains
The TEE network led to the development of several special trains. The German DB built the streamlined
DB Class VT 11.5 , the Swiss SBB and the Dutch NS developed the RAm / DE, both diesel trains. Later the DB used the 160 km/h E 10.12 and the 200 km/hDB Class 103 .Modification of service
Originally the idea was to promote only international routes as TEE routes. This idea was abandoned in
1965 with the introduction of the French "le Mistral" and the German "Blauer Enzian". The reason to abandon this principle is very clear — there are many much longer national routes than some of the international TEE routes.Growth
The network grew in the course of the years, adding three more countries:
Spain (RENFE ),Denmark (DSB) andAustria (ÖBB ) until its height in1974 . But of these three only RENFE became a TEE member, the other two countries had TEE's running through them but the rail administrations never were members. From that time more and more former TEE trains got replaced by other trains giving the same kind of service but allowing also 2nd class. In1979 DB completely restructured the network with the coming of the new national IC services, resulting in successively less TEE services and more IC services in the course of time.The end
By
1984 most services were abandoned, leaving only some national services in (mostly) Italy and France and a very few international services. Most trains were replaced by a new international intercity network with the nameEuroCity which provides both 1st and 2nd class service.List of the TEE-trains
* Train numbers and times of services represent the last day of service
* City names are in their respective country languageExternal links
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p5erN2_4gU Online-Video] Trans Europ Express leaving Cologne central station (about 1990)
References
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