There's bad news for new train station enthusiasts in Baden-Wurttemberg this week, as it was announced that Stuttgart's futuristic transit hub to-be will not be operational in 2026 as was planned.
Stuttgart 21, a new underground station designed to sit underneath Stuttgart's currently functioning Hauptbahnhof, has already seen its unveiling pushed back multiple times.
This week, Deutsche Bahn's new CEO, Evelyn Palla, informed the supervisory board that the project would need to be delayed further. So far no new date for the opening of the station has been set.
According to media reports, Deutsche Bahn does not intend to immediately announce a new opening date.
The current delay is reportedly due to issues with the project's digital signalling system, called a digital node. The idea is that with a digital system in place, which keeps track of where trains are on the tracks and their destinations, trains can be safely guided in and out of the station automatically.
The new Stuttgart station is intended to be the first in Germany to have a completely digitised signal box.
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But, according to reporting by Der Spiegel, there have been difficulties getting approval for the software, which is supplied by the Japanese conglomerate Hitachi.
Faster connections to come
The promised new hub is part of the bigger the Stuttgart–Ulm railway project, which includes the redesign of the Stuttgart station as well as a revised high-speed line from Stuttgart via Wendlingen to Ulm.
When completed, the journey from Stuttgart to Ulm is expected to take about half an hour, cutting travel time between the two southern cities nearly in half.
This connection is also part of numerous longer routes, including from Mannheim to Munich or from Paris to Bratislava.
Therefore the project aims to shorten travel times not just to and from Stuttgart but also throughout the region.
Shall we call it Stuttgart 27 now?
The title of the project, Stuttgart 21, actually has nothing to do with the year 2021 but was chosen to convey the idea that it would transform Stuttgart's central station into one of central Europe's significant transit hubs in the 21st century.
The project is already decades in the making. Deutsche Bahn first presented the project in 1994, and work began in early 2010.
It was originally planned to be completed by the end of 2019, but the opening has since been postponed several times.
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Construction of the new station has caused damage to nearby buildings and roads, and costs have increased dramatically over time. According to initial plans it was to cost €2.5 billion, but when the financing for the construction was presented in 2009, Deutsche Bahn said it would instead cost more than €4.5 billion.
Current estimates put the project at around €11 billion, which is to be borne by Deutsche Bahn as well as governments at virtually every level, from the federal government to the state and the city of Stuttgart, as well as the nearby airport.
The project has been controversial from its start and has sparked many protests, including an event where more than a hundred demonstrators were injured by police water canons, including one man who was nearly blinded.
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