The picture above was taken with my film camera.
The History
The first railway workshop at this plant was launched in 1870 and later on in 1872 and 1873, they opened further workshops on the site. In 1885, all railway lines converging in Poznań came under the state management of the Kingdom of Prussia. Between 1908 and 1913, significant upgrades were made to the technical equipment at the plant. This included the construction of new facilities such as halls for repairing steam locomotives and wagons, a copper forge, a boiler room, as well as workshops for sheet metal, machine tool repairs, and apprentice training. With these expansions, the plant became capable of conducting major repairs on steam locomotives, as well as passenger and freight wagons.
In 1920, the plant came under the ownership of the Polish State Railways and was renamed PKP. It covered an area of around 200,000 m², with approximately 50,000 m² of buildings and 459 repair stations. These stations included 73 for steam locomotives, 16 for steam locomotive tenders, 118 for passenger and covered freight wagons, 240 for open freight wagons, and 12 in the paint shop. To address the lack of specialization in repairing steam locomotive boilers, a makeshift workshop was established initially, followed by the construction of a new hall with 40 repair stations in 1923–1924.
During World War II, the plant operated as Reichsbahn-Ausbesserungswerk Posen and sustained significant damage from bombings in 1944, destroying the freight wagon and old steam locomotive repair halls. The workforce consisted of approximately 4,000 people, with 90% being Poles. Amidst the chaos of the war, much of the plant's machinery and equipment were stolen during the retreat of enemy troops.
On February 12, 1945, the plant resumed repair work on rolling stock under its pre-war name (ZNTK) and was rebuilt over the next two years. In 1957, ZNTK was expanded, which increased its repair capacity five times compared to the pre-war period, and from 1961 the plant was a leading repair centre for diesel rolling stock (even for foreign countries such as The Soviet Union).
In 1995, the state-owned enterprise ZNTK Poznań was transformed into a sole-shareholder joint-stock company named Poznańskie Zakłady Naprawcze Taboru Kolejowego. The company faced financial troubles due to issues with servicing rail buses and overall financial decline, leading to bankruptcy in 2018. Attempts to sell shares and change ownership did not improve the situation. Despite efforts to expand services, including modernizing rail vehicles and designing locomotives, financial difficulties persisted. The company faced strikes and legal settlements with former employees, and its assets were put up for sale in 2014, but ownership remained unchanged. Enforcement proceedings were halted in 2017 due to insolvency, and the court declared bankruptcy in October 2018.
The Explore
This plant was massive, like a whole city for repairing trains. Some buildings were workshops, some were offices. We could get on top of many of the rooftops and there were still so many documents just lying around. It was quite easy to sneak in as all we had to do was walk through some woods and we were in. All the buildings were open and although there were supposed to be guards around the area we never ran into any.
For some reason, there was a lot of tape hanging from the ceiling in one of the workshops. Does anyone know what the reason could be here?
