vienna west or wien westbahnhof

Wien Westbahnhof (Vienna West Station, or Vienna Western Station) is a major Austrian railway station, the starting point of the Austrian Western Railway (Westbahn) for trains to (Salzburg, Munich, Frankfurt, Zürich, Budapest, Bucharest, Belgrad etc). As well as long-distance routes, local trains (S-Bahn-line S50 ) and two underground (U-Bahn) lines reach the Westbahnhof ( U3 and U6 ). Six streetcar lines converge on the Europaplatz in front of the station, of which none go into the city center.

The Westbahnhof is in Vienna's 15th District Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus on the Gürtel inner-city traffic artery. The southward-running Mariahilfer Street provides a direct route into the center of the city.

The Westbahnhof is, with the Südbahnhof (south station) one of the two large Viennese train stations and as such the point of departure for trains to Germany, Poland, and beyond to France and Belgium, among other places. Via the Speisinger Connector, there is also connection to Hungary, Serbia, and Romania in the east and southeast. Because it is a terminus station, Westbahn trains going on to Hungary must leave the station backwards and reverse to continue on.

At the same time, the Westbahnhof is the departure point for regional rail lines into the west of Vienna that are included in the Eastern Regional Traffic Authority and belong in part to the Viennese S-Bahn.

With the establishment of the long-planned Hauptbahnhof (main station), the Westbahnhof will lose some of its significance, since international trains, above all those that go on to Eastern Europe, will then be routed through a connecting tunnel under the Lainzer Zoo, which is already under construction, directly to the Zentralbahnhof. At this time, a reduction in the station's size is to be expected and concepts for the utilization of the surplus space are already being solicited.