Abandoned Iron Rhine Railway

"... The Iron Rhine is the name of a railway line running from the port of Duisburg to the port of Antwerp via Mönchengladbach and Roermond. Until cross-border freight traffic on the section between Dalheim and Roermond was discontinued in 1992, it was the shortest railway connection from the Ruhr area to the Belgian seaports and is 60 kilometers shorter than the connection via the Montzen route between Aachen West and Tongeren.[4] Often the term Iron Rhine only refers to the railway line from Rheydt Hauptbahnhof to Antwerp, since parts of the previously built Aachen–Mönchengladbach line form part of the overall connection and Duisburg-Ruhrort–Mönchengladbach as well as the Mönchengladbach freight bypass line.
The name Iron Rhine was originally used for the Cologne–Aachen trunk line of the Rhenish Railway Company between Cologne and the Herbesthal border station as part of the connection to Antwerpen-Berchem from Cologne via Düren, Eschweiler, Aachen, Verviers, Liège and Louvain, and later became more common the printout for the route via Mönchengladbach and Roermond.

The term Iron Rhine was coined by Ludolf Camphausen, who wrote in his 1833 memorandum on the railway from Cologne to Antwerp:
"Belgium, wedged between France's mercantile system, between the so bitterly offended Holland, and Prussia's liberal commercial policy, where will it find its natural ally?"
Without a doubt, the answer to this rhetorical question is: in Prussia.
"The road (railway) to Antwerp, which will ensure mutual supplies to both Prussia and Belgium, is the first thread that the German commercial state stretches out to the North Sea."
It goes on to say:
“But this free passage has an unmistakable impact on all conditions of navigation on the Rhine, and ends Holland’s monopoly of intermediate trade. Germany remained tributary to Holland for the use of the Rhine for two centuries, and so it is today. It is in the nature of things that the payment of this tribute ends with the first carriage rolling on the free track from Cologne to Antwerp, that Holland will be forced to offer German trade everything that the new, the iron Rhine affords them .”

Further information on the history, route description etc.:
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eiserner_Rhein
krefeld.de/de/stadtplanung/eiserner-rhein-7600137
vrt.be/vrtnws/de/2021/06/16/die-niederlaender-oeffnen-sich-komm-dann-doch-neues-leben-in-d

always interesting ....

REITERHOF
VENHOF with its cafe