page_title: Essen Stadtbahn
section_title: The lines in detail
hierarchical_section_title: Essen Stadtbahn / Lines and stations / The lines in detail
caption_attribution_description: Essen Stadtbahn, U-Bhf Wickenburgstraße
context_page_description: The Essen Stadtbahn is a 19.6-kilometer light rail network in Essen and the two neighbouring towns of Mülheim an der Ruhr and Gelsenkirchen in the German state of North Rhine Westphalia. It forms part of the Rhine-Ruhr Stadtbahn.
  Like the Frankfurt U-Bahn, it is a mixed system of light rail and underground railway. One of its three lines, U18, runs completely free of intersections with other traffic. The other two lines are partly tramlines and partly underground lines. The sections of tramline have only a few sections that have no intersections with road traffic.
  Like all urban public transport in Essen, the Essen Stadtbahn is operated by Ruhrbahn, a company owned by the Cities of Essen and Mülheim an der Ruhr. The transport companies of neighbouring municipalities are also involved with the operation of some lines under concessions.
context_section_description: The numbering of the line follows the VRR’s system for Stadtbahn lines, which is composed as follows: the preceding "U" indicates that it is a Stadtbahn line that is largely or completely separated from traffic and that it is not a tram or bus line. This is followed by a number that represents the area of the transport lines, in Essen and Mülheim this is 1. The second digit is the local line number, which in Essen is not assigned in consecutive order, but instead reflects the number of the tram line that it replaced or which ran nearby.
caption: Entrance to Wickenburgstraße station on the U18
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "SONY", "Image Model": "DSC-P52", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2006:12:26 15:05:39", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "256", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Make": "SONY", "Thumbnail Model": "DSC-P52", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail DateTime": "2006:12:26 15:05:39", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2385", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "2753", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/100", "EXIF FNumber": "19/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2006:12:26 15:05:39", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2006:12:26 15:05:39", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "31/8", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "63/10", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1280", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "960", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "2178", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}