In the past, some people used to sneer at the "sauferbahnle" when they talked about the trains heading for the volkach main loop. Since the railroad tracks around volkach, which were closed in 1991, have been kept in good condition by an association, they have become an important part of tourism. This is also the view of the members of the tourism concept "franken – wein.Schooner.Country!" So, who awarded the tenth wine tourism prize to the mainschleifenbahn on monday in the karl-knauf hall in iphofen.
Price handed over
It was people like wolfgang schramm who, starting in 1994, worried about preserving the tracks that had been paid for by the german railroad to the old iron. Consequently, he too, together with chairman christian obwald and other representatives of the community of interests, from which the mainschleifenbahn demand association emerged in 1999, accepted the prize from the hands of the french wine queen silena werner.
Penalty work
In his laudatory speech, the president of the french winegrowers’ association, artur steinmann, recalled "the many blisters and calluses on the hands, which must seem like convict labor," which certainly sometimes had to be complained about by the hard-working helpers who in the 1990s cleared the now orphaned slopes of overgrowth and mud. About 4300 hours of volunteer work have gone into making the route passable again.
The railroad rolled
The first test runs in june 1996 were followed by further maintenance inspections and the "loosening up" of demand funds. In september 2003, the time had come for the mainschleifenbahn to start rolling. Since february 2004, he has also owned the red rail bus, which is widely known as a trademark and which runs between may and october between the stops between seligenstadt and volkach. In 2017, the mainschleifenbahn transported around 14,000 guests, some of whom had traveled from far away and who, according to statistics, leave behind approximately 200,000 euros in additional sales in the region.
Moving monument
For steinmann, the mainschleifenbahn is not just a means of transport with which one can drink one’s schnapps "carefree and without danger" while touring the region and returning home safely after enjoying the wine. The rail bus is a "moving monument" that combines wine tourism with tradition.
Keynote speaker in berlin
The keynote speaker at the award ceremony, which was a kind of prelude to the 8. At the first international wine tourism symposium in iphofen, joachim herrmann (CSU), bavarian state minister of the interior, construction and transport and chairman of the franken tourism association, was actually in charge of the event. However, he was at the coalition negotiations between his sister party, the CDU, and the SPD.
Nevertheless, mainschleifenbahn chairman christian oswald addressed him with the wish to soon receive a statement on the subject of reactivation. If a rail vehicle ran between volkach and wurzburg every day, and not just during the season, there would be a continuous direct connection in 25 minutes. "This would be a real quantum leap for the region," said obwald.
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