page_title: Freiburg Hauptbahnhof
section_title: First building (1845–1945)
hierarchical_section_title: Freiburg Hauptbahnhof / Architecture / First building (1845–1945)
caption_attribution_description: English: Freiburg Main Station in 1890 Deutsch: Freiburger Hauptbahnhof 1890
context_page_description: Freiburg Hauptbahnhof is the main railway station in the German city of Freiburg im Breisgau. The Rhine Valley Railway, Höllentalbahn and the Breisach Railway meet here.
  The station is located on the western outskirts of the Old Town of Freiburg, about a kilometre from Freiburg Minster at 5–7 Bismarckallee. This street is also fronted by the Freiburg concert hall, several hotels and the Jazzhaus Freiburg jazz club and the Xpress office complex was built along the line in 2008.
  The first station building was built in 1845 in the Rundbogenstil, with Romanesque Revival elements. A temporary station built after the destruction of the station in 1944/45 lasted 50 years. This was replaced around the turn of the 21st century with an ensemble of buildings, including the station hall, a shopping mall, hotels and office blocks. With around 38,300 passengers per day, in 2005 it was the fifth largest railway station in Baden-Württemberg.
  It is a Category 2 station serving southern Baden-Württemberg.
context_section_description: The two-storey station building was built to the design of the architect Friedrich Eisenlohr in the historicist style of the time with many Romanesque Revival components.  As with the other important stations in Baden, the building in Freiburg was implemented in the Rundbogenstil (round arch style), which explains the preference for round-arched openings in walls and arcades.
  The reception building was 70 metres long, 40 metres of this was built as two storeys. Its vestibule was reached through one of seven arches, which extended between two wings and were formed with lesenes. Above the roof turret there was a clock tower, which was crowned in the early drawings by a "graceful spire." After the spire was removed, which is already visible in photographs of 1910, the preservationist Manfred Berger considered the clock detracted from the otherwise well-balanced construction. On the ground floor there were offices for railway staff and rooms for a telegraph office and a post office. On the second floor there was housing for railway employees.
  Between the platform area and the entrance building there was an open courtyard with a fountain, modelled after a Greek or Roman atrium. Along the sides there were facilities necessary for travel, including three waiting rooms for the first to third classes. The connecting building was, in contrast to many other former station buildings, arranged perpendicular to the tracks. This allowed Eisenlohr to leave the platform area and the entrance building as separate architectural units, despite the connection. However, passengers had to take into account a long walk.
  The train shed was 110 metres long and 16.3 metres wide with ridgeline of the roof at a height of 12.3 metres, the biggest in Baden. It consisted of three naves in the style of a basilica with roofs that could be drained externally. This was an improvement over Mannheim station, where there had only been two naves and there had been problems with drainage.  The slate roof lay on a structure made of native wood, as Eisenlohr had avoided expensive cast iron for reasons of cost. Nevertheless, this station was, like many other stations in Baden, criticised at first for its opulence.
  As the freight yard was not yet separated from the passenger station, the loading of freight was possible using a loading siding and a loading road on both sides of the station. On the west side of the station there were larger loading areas and cranes, but no large gantry crane. The freight halls were on the east side of the station. The entrance freight hall contained both of the customs warehouses. The receiving and shipping area were each 99 metres long but only 13.5 meters wide. The express freight hall had a storage area of 640 m².
  The only remaining building of the original station area, the carriage halls that were built in 1845 between Wenzingerstraße and track 8, are both under heritage protection.
caption: The entrance building (1890)
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