Frankenstein (Pfalz) station

Frankenstein (Pfalz)
Through station
Frankenstein station with the former station building in the background
Location	Hauptstr. 9, Frankenstein, Rhineland-Palatinate Germany
Coordinates	49°26′21″N 7°58′11″E / 49.439034°N 7.969846°E / 49.439034; 7.969846Coordinates: 49°26′21″N 7°58′11″E / 49.439034°N 7.969846°E / 49.439034; 7.969846
Line(s)	Mannheim–Saarbrücken (km 59.25) (KBS 670)
Platforms	2
Construction
Architectural style	Neoclassical
Other information
Station code	1846
DS100 code	RFST
IBNR	8002036
Category	6
Website	www.bahnhof.de
History
Opened	2 December 1848

Frankenstein (Pfalz) station is the station of the town of Frankenstein in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. Deutsche Bahn classifies it as a category 6 station and it has two platforms.

It is located on the Mannheim–Saarbrücken railway, which essentially consists of the Palatine Ludwig Railway (Pfälzische Ludwigsbahn, Ludwigshafen–Bexbach). It was opened on 2 December 1848 with the Kaiserslautern–Frankenstein section of the Ludwig Railway. On 25 August of the following year, the gap to Neustadt was closed, so that the Ludwig Railway had reached its full length. Since December 2003 it has been a stop for services on line S1 and S2 of the Rhine-Neckar S-Bahn. Its entrance building is a protected monument.

The halt (Haltepunkt) is located on the northwestern outskirts of Frankenstein (Pfalz). Its address is Hauptstraße 9.Federal highway 37 and the Hochspeyerbach run directly parallel to the railway track. A few hundred metres east of it is the Schlossberg (castle hill) of Frankenstein Castle, which the line passes under through the Schlossberg Tunnel. North of the station, the village of Diemerstein is located in the Diemerstein valley. The Glasbach flows into the Hochspeyerbach to the west of the station.

Originally, it had been planned to build a railway orientated north-south within the then Bavarian Circle of the Rhine (Rheinkreis) to compete with the Baden’s projected Mannheim–Basel railway. At the same time, industrialists from the Palatinate, which had also been called the Rheinkreis since the 1830s, had an interest in facilitating the transport of coal to the Rhine from the mines in the area around Bexbach. A route running generally through Kaiserslautern and as a result Frankenstein was established during the early planning period. Frankenstein had a station from the beginning, unlike the larger neighbouring town of Hochspeyer. The interests of Paul Camille Denis, the builder of the Ludwig Railway played an important role In the process. On the one hand, he was a friend of Carl Adolph Ritter, who was living in the village. In addition, Denis settled down temporarily in the village, acquired Diemerstein Castle and built a villa, the so-called Villa Denis, in the immediate vicinity. On 21 December 1837 the Bavarian king Ludwig I. approved the construction of a main line running east-west from Rheinschanze to Bexbach.