The first train between Pest and Buda ran 145 years ago

The most important Hungarian railway bridge was opened on 23 October 1877, on the southern outskirts of Budapest. It served railway traffic for only 36 years. The construction of the original structure was the subject of much controversy, and several lawsuits followed its completion.

The first Danube bridge in Hungary

The Connecting Railway Bridge (Összekötő vasúti híd) was opened to traffic on 23 October 1877, thus establishing a railway link between the two parts of the country. Until then, there was no railway bridge over the Hungarian section of the Danube, PestBuda writes.

There was much debate about where this connection should be made. In the 1860s, everyone imagined connecting the railway lines in the north, along the present-day Margaret Boulevard – Margaret Bridge – Szent István Boulevard route. However, in 1869, the government decided in favour of the southern route.

One of the reasons for this was that MÁV was already in operation at the time, with its lines starting from the former Józsefváros station, and it was also important to the government that the railway across the Danube should not be managed by private railway companies.

On the one hand, if the northern link had been built, it would have connected two private railways and would not have been connected to the MÁV network. On the other hand, in the north, they wanted to implement other plans, the Margaret Bridge and the elegant Grand Boulevard (Nagykörú), and therefore preferred the longer, more expensive southern link.

There was also a plan to run the railway further away, through Csepel, but in the end it was decided to follow a route closer to the city. The idea of building a new central railway station for MÁV also came up at the same time. It was accepted, but the central station was not opened at that time, but years later, in 1884. It is now the Keleti Railway Station.