The railway

The railway through Soest was built as a light local railway by the Nederlandsche Centraal-Spoorweg-Maatschappij (Dutch Central Railway Company, NCS). The NCS had several of these local railways in the middle of The Netherlands. The Soest branch line has always been a single track railway. Only a few stations are on this short line: Soest-Zuid, Soest, Soestdijk and Baarn. Only the station at Soest has two tracks. The train from Utrecht will wait here for the train from Baarn to pass before it can continue to Baarn.

The railway was opened on 27th June 1898 and it was electrified in 1948. It is the only light local railway in the province of Utrecht that has overhead wires and it is the only one that is still in service today. Originally, the NCS had its own station in Baarn. It was close to today’s station, which was owned by the HSM at the time. The NCS station was closed in 1948 and passenger trains stop at the main station in Baarn since then. The old NCS station has been preserved. It is now restaurant De Generaal.

Royal passengers

As you might know, the Duth royal family has been living in this area for a long time. Soestdijk Palace and Drakestijn c astle (private property of Queen Beatrix) are very close to the railway line. Soestdijk even has its own station. The royal family used to travel by train occasionally in the old days. At Baarn and Soestdijk were special royal waiting rooms. At Soestdijk a special roof was built over the platform, so the queen could get into the awaiting train without getting wet. Soestdijk must the smallest station in the world with a royal waiting room.

The little railway saw an impressive amount of goods transportation. At Soest station alone were several coal depots and cattle transporters with their own sidings. Various companies had warehouses and workshops at Baarn station. Most stations had goods facilities. Just about everything was transported by the local railway, but it never saw really long goods trains. It was after all, only a light local railway.