Strategic Railway Embankment
Coordinates: 51°04′44″N 6°42′30″E / 51.0789°N 6.7083°E
The Strategic Railway Embankment (German: Strategischer Bahndamm) is a railway line between the Ruhr and the south-western border of Germany, which was never finished. This name is derived from the section of this line that runs over a railway embankment between Neuss and Rommerskirchen, which was built as part of the northern section of the line.
At the beginning of the 20th century, railways were increasingly involved in the strategic considerations of the military, particularly for the rapid deployment of German troops against France. Under the influence of the Chief of the Imperial German General Staff, Alfred von Schlieffen, a whole series of new railway lines were planned as strategic railways were and partly built. The Strategic Railway Embankment (or "Ruhr–Moselle relief line") was one of them.
The imperial government determined that the strategic railway would be double track from its junctions with the railways of the Ruhr and bypass the railway bottlenecks of Düsseldorf and Cologne, running from Neuss via Rommerskirchen, Niederaußem, Horrem, Liblar and Rheinbach to Rech in the Ahr valley. Trains would be then run via the Ahr Valley Railway and the Eifel Railway to the Saarland and Lorraine. In 1915, it was also decided that the "Ruhr–Moselle relief line" would connect in a southerly direction over the Ringen–Bad Bodendorf section, continuing via the Ahr Valley Railway directly to the Rhine valley lines (West and East Rhine Railways) and the Remagen railway junction.
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