Intercity Express
Intercity Express is a high-speed rail system and service in Germany. It also serves destinations in Austria, France, Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands as part of cross-border services. It is the flagship of the German state railway, Deutsche Bahn. ICE fares are fixed for station-to-station connections, on the grounds that the trains have a higher level of comfort. Travelling at speeds up to within Germany and when in France, they are aimed at business travellers and long-distance commuters and marketed by Deutsche Bahn as an alternative to flights.
The ICE 3 also has been the development base for the Siemens Velaro family of trainsets which has subsequently been exported to Renfe in Spain, which are certified to run at speeds up to, as well as versions ordered by China for the Beijing–Tianjin intercity railway link and by Russia for the Moscow–Saint Petersburg and Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod routes with further customers being Eurostar as well as Turkey and Egypt.
History
The Deutsche Bundesbahn started a series of trials in 1985 using the InterCityExperimental test train. The IC Experimental was used as a showcase train and for high-speed trials, setting a new world speed record at 406.9 km/h on 1 May 1988.The train was retired in 1996 and replaced with a new trial unit, called the ICE S.
After extensive discussion between the Bundesbahn and the Ministry of Transport regarding onboard equipment, length and width of the train and the number of trainsets required, a first batch of 41 units was ordered in 1988. The order was extended to 60 units in 1990, with German reunification in mind. However, not all trains could be delivered in time.
The ICE network was officially inaugurated on 29 May 1991 with several vehicles converging on the newly built station Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe from different directions.
In 2007, a line between Paris and Frankfurt/Stuttgart opened, jointly operated by ICE and SNCF's TGV.
Equipment
Overview
First generation
The first ICE trains were the trainsets of ICE 1, which came into service in 1989. The first regularly scheduled ICE trains ran from 2 June 1991 from Hamburg-Altona via Hamburg Hbf–Hannover Hbf–Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe–Fulda–Frankfurt Hbf–Mannheim Hbf and Stuttgart Hbf toward München Hbf at hourly intervals on the new ICE line 6. The Hanover-Würzburg line and the Mannheim-Stuttgart line, which had both opened the same year, were hence integrated into the ICE network from the very beginning.Due to the lack of trainsets in 1991 and early 1992, the ICE line 4 could not start operation until 1 June 1992. Prior to that date, ICE trainsets were used when available and were integrated in the Intercity network and with IC tariffs.
In 1993, the ICE line 6
Second generation
From 1997, the successor, the ICE 2 trains pulled by Class 402 powerheads, was put into service. One of the goals of the ICE 2 was to improve load balancing by building smaller train units which could be coupled or detached as needed.These trainsets were used on the ICE line 10 Berlin-Cologne/Bonn. However, since the driving van trailers of the trains were still awaiting approval, the DB joined two portions to form a long train, similar to the ICE 1. Only from 24 May 1998 were the ICE 2 units fully equipped with driving van trailers and could be portioned on their run from Hamm via either Dortmund Hbf–Essen Hbf–Duisburg Hbf–Düsseldorf Hbf or Hagen Hbf–Wuppertal Hbf–Solingen-Ohligs.
In late 1998, the Hanover–Berlin high-speed railway was opened as the third high-speed line in Germany, cutting travel time on line 10 by 2½ hours.
The ICE 1 and ICE 2 trains' loading gauge exceeds that recommended by the international railway organisation UIC. Even though the trains were originally to be used only domestically, some units are licensed to run in Switzerland and Austria. Some ICE 1 units have been equipped with an additional smaller pantograph to be able to run on the different Swiss overhead wire geometry.
All ICE 1 and ICE 2 trains are single-voltage 15 kV AC, which restricts their radius of operation largely to the German-speaking countries of Europe. ICE 2 trains can run at a top speed of 280 km/h.
Third generation
To overcome the restrictions imposed on the ICE 1 and ICE 2, their successor, the ICE 3, was built to a smaller loading gauge to permit usability throughout the entire European standard gauge network, with the sole exception being the UK's domestic railway network. Unlike their predecessors, the ICE 3 units are built not as trains with separate passenger and power cars, but as electric multiple units with underfloor motors throughout. This also reduced the load per axle and enabled the ICE 3 to comply with the pertinent UIC standard.Initially two different classes were developed: the Class 403 and the Class 406, the M standing for Mehrsystem. Later came Class 407 and Class 408. The trains were labelled and marketed as the Velaro by their manufacturer, Siemens.
Just like the ICE 2, the ICE 3 and the ICE 3M were developed as short trains, and are able to travel in a system where individual units run on different lines, then being coupled to travel together. Since the ICE 3 trains are the only ones able to run on the Köln-Frankfurt high-speed line with its 4.0% incline at the allowed maximum speed of 300 km/h, they are used predominantly on services that utilise this line.
In 2009 Deutsche Bahn ordered another 16 units – worth € 495 million – for international traffic, especially to France.
The Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle high-speed railway, which opened in December 2015, is one of three lines in Germany that are equipped for a line speed of. Since only 3rd generation ICE trains can travel at this speed, the ICE line 41, formerly running from Essen Hbf via Duisburg Hbf–Frankfurt Südbf to Nürnberg Hbf, was extended over the Nuremberg-Ingolstadt high-speed rail line and today the service run is Oberhausen Hbf–Duisburg Hbf–Frankfurt Hbf–Nürnberg Hbf–Ingolstadt Hbf–München Hbf.
The ICE 3 runs at speeds up to on the LGV Est railway Strasbourg–Paris in France.
A new generation ICE 3, Class 407, is part of the Siemens Velaro family with the model designation Velaro D. It currently runs on many services in Germany and through to other countries like France. Initially this train type was meant to execute the planned Deutsche Bahn services through the Channel Tunnel to London. As the trains had not received a certification for running in Belgium and due to the competition of budget airlines the London service was cancelled.
In 2020 Deutsche Bahn placed an order with Siemens for 30 trains, and options for another 60, of the Velaro design and based on the previously procured ICE Class 407. Referenced by Siemens as Velaro MS, these trains are called ICE 3neo by Deutsche Bahn and classified as 408. The trains are designed for operation at 320 km/h and were deployed at the end of 2022 on routes that use the Cologne – Frankfurt high speed line which is designed for operation at 300 km/h. After a production time of only 12 months including trial runs the first train was presented to journalists in February of 2022. At that occasion the order was increased by 43 trainsets, with all 73 trains supposed to be in service by early 2029. In May of 2023 Deutsche Bahn announced that it was calling the last 17 trains from the option, bringing the total order up to 90 trains.
In April 2025, the multisystem Class 406 trainsets were retired from service due to ongoing maintenance and reliability issues. They were already relegated to domestic services beforehand and replaced with Class 407 on international routes.
Fourth generation
Procurement of ICx trainsets started c. 2008 as replacements for locomotive hauled InterCity and EuroCity train services - the scope was later expanded to include replacements for ICE 1 and ICE 2 trainsets. In 2011 Siemens was awarded the contract for 130 seven car intercity train replacements, and 90 ten car ICE train replacements, plus further options - the contract for the ten car sets was modified in 2013 to expand the trainset length to twelve vehicles. The name ICx was used for the trains during the initial stages of the procurement; in late 2015 the trains were rebranded ICE 4, at the unveiling of the first trainset, and given the class designation 412 by Deutsche Bahn.Two pre-production trainsets were manufactured and used for testing prior to the introduction of the main series.
ICE T and ICE TD
Simultaneously with the ICE 3, Siemens developed trains with tilting technology, using much of the ICE 3 technical design. The class 411 and 415 ICE T EMUs and class 605 ICE TD DMUs were built with a similar interior and exterior design. They were specially designed for older railway lines not suitable for high speeds, for example the twisting lines in Thuringia. ICE-TD has diesel traction. ICE-T and ICE-TD could have be operated jointly, but this has not been done routinely.ICE T
A total of 60 class 411 and 11 class 415 have been built so far. Both classes work reliably. Austria's ÖBB purchased three units in 2007, operating them jointly with DB. Even though DB assigned the name ICE-T to class 411/415, the T originally did not stand for tilting, but for Triebwagen, as DB's marketing department at first deemed the top speed too low for assignment of the InterCityExpress brand and therefore planned to refer to this class as IC-T.The trainsets of the T series were manufactured in 1999. The tilting system has been provided by Fiat Ferroviaria, now part of Alstom. ICE T trains can run at speeds of up to 230 km/h.
In April 2025, Deutsche Bahn announced the gradual retirement of the 5-car Class 415 from June 2025.