Borkumer Kleinbahn- und Dampfschiffahrt (BKD)

Updated: August 2026 – There are railways in Germany that you can only reach by ship. The Borkumer Kleinbahn- und Dampfschiffahrt carries this peculiarity right in its company name: two modes of transport, one company. This page explains what makes an island railway different operationally, why narrow-gauge vehicles have to be identified differently from standard-gauge ones – and how to record your observations so that they’re worth something later.

What is the Borkumer Kleinbahn- und Dampfschiffahrt?

The Borkumer Kleinbahn- und Dampfschiffahrt is a German transport company whose name reveals an unusual amount. It names the place, the historic form of operation (“Kleinbahn”, light railway) and a second mode of transport (“Dampfschiffahrt”, steamship company). That makes it clear straight away that this is not simply a railway operation, but a continuous transport chain from the mainland across the water to the town on the island.

The term “Kleinbahn” is more than folklore. It comes from historic German railway law and referred to railways of local importance that could be built and operated under relaxed conditions. A great many of today’s regional railway companies grew out of this category – often as public limited companies with local shareholders, often with their own line, often with several roles at once.

On an island, this pattern is taken to the extreme: traffic, network and fleet are inevitably in one pair of hands, because there is nobody else who could take on another role.

What makes an island railway different operationally

Isolation shapes every detail. Once you think through the difference from the mainland network, you immediately understand why island railways have such distinctive vehicles.

Feature	Mainland network	Island railway
Network connection	through connections across Europe	none – access only by ship
Outside operators	regularly on the same tracks	practically ruled out
Swapping and hiring vehicles	possible at any time	costly, only via shipping
Maintenance	workshops reachable on the network	largely on site
Fleet	changes frequently	small, stable, easy to keep track of
Timetable logic	frequencies and connections within the network	timed to match ship arrivals

The last row is the most important in practice for spotters. An island railway doesn’t follow the rhythm of the rail network but that of the ships – and thus ultimately the tide tables and the season. If you want to take photos there, plan around the ship times, not the number of trains.

Identification in the field: reading narrow gauge correctly

With standard-gauge vehicles, things are clear: find the data panel, read the country code and vehicle keeper marking, note the twelve-digit number. On isolated narrow-gauge operations, this system doesn’t always apply, because it is tailored to interconnected traffic.

Because narrow-gauge vehicles are often older and their fleet remains stable for decades, a different approach pays off here than in mainstream traffic: the question “which class?” doesn’t get you further, but “which specific vehicle?” does. The way there is via the number, the builder’s plate and the vehicle’s condition.

The world of narrow-gauge vehicles

Narrow-gauge operations work with vehicles that don’t exist in this form on the standard-gauge network. Small, robust diesel locomotives from specialist manufacturers dominate the scene, along with coaches of considerably smaller dimensions. In the class database you’ll find representatives of this world: the narrow-gauge passenger coaches of Class 996, the driving trailer type Class 998 and compact narrow-gauge diesels such as the Schöma CFL-40 DR, whose design is widespread on industrial, field and narrow-gauge railways. Machines like these are built by Schöma Kleinlokomotiven.

What’s particularly interesting about such fleets is their longevity. Because every vehicle arriving or leaving means a ship or heavy-haulage transport, vehicles stay in the same place for a very long time. They are repaired rather than replaced, rebuilt rather than withdrawn, and so after decades they carry a visible history with them: modified bodywork, retrofitted lighting, different couplings, markings revised several times. It is precisely these layers that make a sighting on an island railway valuable – more so, at any rate, than simply establishing that a particular vehicle exists.

A comparison with other narrow-gauge and island operations makes the pattern clear: the Inselbahn Langeoog as another island system in north-west Germany, the Harzer Schmalspurbahnen as a large interconnected narrow-gauge network and the Mecklenburgische Bäderbahn Molli as a narrow-gauge coastal service. Three operations, three completely different starting points – and in all three the same basic question of gauge, fleet and accessibility. On the East Frisian mainland opposite, the Museumseisenbahn Küstenbahn Ostfriesland e.V. runs heritage trains between Norden and Dornum.

Photographing and documenting island operations

How to build this into a collection you can use for years is described in the guide to the sightings log. And because coastal light and crosswinds make their own demands, it’s worth looking beforehand at the tips on how to take good photos of trains.

Common mix-ups

• Equating a Kleinbahn with a heritage railway – “Kleinbahn” describes a historic form of operation, not necessarily a heritage purpose.
• Confusing narrow gauge with a field railway – both are narrow gauge, but public passenger services and industrial traffic are fundamentally different.
• Reading a missing UIC number as a mistake – in a closed operation, the running number is the definitive identifier.
• Confusing the design with the vehicle – with small fleets, the specific example counts, not the type.
• Concluding from the name that it’s passenger-only – island railways have traditionally also handled supply tasks; only the company itself can say what that looks like today.

Verdict

Island railways are the opposite of the big interconnected system: small, closed, in one pair of hands – and precisely for that reason an excellent training ground. If you document carefully here, you practise exactly the distinction that often gets lost on the big network: between design and vehicle, between observation and conclusion.