page_title: Railbus
section_title: Germany
hierarchical_section_title: Railbus / Usage by country / Germany
caption_attribution_description: One of two simultaneous departures of railbuses from Gotha&#160;: the 12.17 to Crawinkel Zug was no 16017 and Friedrichswerth, Zug no 8912. I have no idea which one this was. I suspect it was the former as the latter left from the bay. KBS 614 at that time survives is now renumbered kbs 572 and has a timetable not greatly altered since Reichsbahn times. The Friedrichswerth route vanished in 1995
context_page_description: A railbus is a lightweight passenger rail vehicle that shares many aspects of its construction with a bus, typically having a bus body and four wheels on a fixed base, instead of on bogies. Originally designed and developed during the 1930s, railbuses have evolved into larger dimensions, with characteristics similar in appearance to a light railcar, with the terms railcar and railbus often used interchangeably. Railbuses designed for use specifically on little-used railway lines were commonly employed in countries such as Germany, Italy, France, the United Kingdom and Sweden.
  Today, railbuses are being replaced by modern light DMU railcar designs.
context_section_description: In Germany, the Schienenbus was developed in the 1930s to fulfill the need for an inexpensive rail vehicle. It was built to standard specifications on Germany’s Reichsbahn (the predecessor to DB) to meet the demand for cost-effective services on light railways or Kleinbahnen  (the Wismar railbus was a pioneer in those days.) After the Second World War, the eventually ubiquitous Uerdingen railbuses were developed by Deutsche Bundesbahn in single-engined and double-engined versions. The latter were powerful enough to haul through coaches and freight cars. Matching trailers and driving trailers were developed as well. These railbuses were a predecessor of the modern diesel multiple units. In the late 1950s, Deutsche Reichsbahn in the GDR developed the single-engined class VT 2.09 with matching trailers and driving trailers, built by Waggonbau Bautzen.
  A number of serious accidents in Germany in the late 1970s involving railbuses resulted in the specification and development of larger, more robustly designed diesel railcars. Although these cars were more similar in size to the U.S. produced diesel railcars, they would not have complied with current FRA requirements, and, like their North American cousin rail diesel cars, are largely railroad-derivative designs. The DB Class 628 exemplifies the contemporary German diesel railcar. This type of car replaced the Schienenbus and locomotive-hauled train consists where possible on branch-line and main-line assignments during the 1980s and 1990s. Both the Uerdingen Schienenbus and the Bautzen railbuses have virtually disappeared from regular revenue service, but its diesel rail car successors are still widely used. DMUs of a third generation in succession after the Schienenbus are now being ordered by the hundreds in a variety of modular design combinations.
caption: VT 2.09 of Deutsche Reichsbahn
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