Useful Notes / Copenhagen S-Tog and Metro

While less famous than many of its European contempories, Copenhagen bosts one of the most forward-thinking and popular urban railway systems in the world, currently divided between the S-Tog commuter system and the local Metro.

In a political context, Copenhagen is perhaps most famous for its "Finger Plan", a 1947 urban development plan that recommended concentrating the city's growth within narrow urban corridors (the 'fingers') that would feed into the city center (the 'palm'). This plan is often praised in retrospect for helping Copenhagen avoid the issues of massive urban sprawl that major cities often faced in the post-war years, as well as ensuring that the city would be a pioneer in the modern idea of transit-oriented development. It is thanks to this that, despite the modest size of Copenhagen's urban railway system, it remains intensely used and a key part of the city's civic life.

The S-Tog:

The S-Tog is Copenhagen's commuter railway system, which as the name suggests takes inspiration from the S-Bahn systems of Germany. The S-Tog was formally established in 1934 with the electrification of parts of the city's local train network, which has expanded over the years to the comprehensive system we have today.

The S-Tog holds a special distinction for being one of the quirkiest mainline railways in the world. Its electrification voltage is at 1.7kV DC, making it incompatible with Denmark's 25kV 50Hz AC mainline standard. Its modern rolling stock, the Alstom and Siemens-produced Litra SA◊ and Litra SE◊, are distinguished by their noticeable hexagonal shape, extremely short coaches with just a single centrally-placed door each, and a single bogey design. This makes each trainset extremely light and flexible, making it more metro-like compared to other commuter networks. In the future, automation of the S-Tog is on the agenda, which would make it among the largest automated railways in the world.

There are seven lines, lettered as the A, B, Bx, C, E, F, and H. As is typical of an S-Bahn system, most of these lines travel together through the city core at a metro-like frequency before diverging at each end to serve a wide net of suburbs and commuter towns. The lines are often operated in pairs that complement each other by allowing for express services on the outer edges of each line, a style of operation that is perhaps familiar to regular users of the New York City Subway.

• The A and E combined run from Hillerød in the north to Køge in the south. On the northern branch, the A runs as an express service, while the E terminates earlier on the route at Holte. In the south the favor is returned, with the E running as an express while the A terminates early at Hundige, with every other train going slightly further to Solrød Stran. Close to the northern end of the line is the S-Tog's least used station, Høvelte, which serves the adjacent Høvelte Barracks and features just a single platform on the northbound track, seeing only a few early morning and late evening services along with the occasional request stop.
• The B runs between Farum in the north and Høje Taastrup in the west. The Bx complements this line at peak hours, terminating early on the nothern branch at Buddlinge, and running as an express service on the southern branch.
• The C runs between Frederikssund in the west to Klampenborg in the north, running express between Husum and Vanløse on its western branch. It is complemented by the H, which runs all stops betweeen Ballerup and Østerport, making it the only service to terminate within the city core.
• The F is unique as the only line that avoids the city core, as well as the only line that is not paired up with another one for operational purposes. Its route follows the Ringbanen, an orbital railway that trails the western edge of the city center between Hellerup and Ny Ellebjerg, creating interchanges with every other S-Tog branch as it does so.

On weekends and evenings, the E and H lines cease to run, and the A and C run a full-line local service in their place.

The Metro:

The Copenhagen Metro is very young by European standards, but also prides itself as one of the most modern. As the S-Tog already exists as a comprehensive system to support longer commuting journeys, the Metro instead sought to be laser-focused on enabling frequent short-distance journeys within the city center.

The system is fully-automated and offers a 24/7 service. Many tricks are used to achieve this, such as by installing a large number of switchovers so portions of the system can run single-track at night, accommodating maintenance works without shutting down the line. The trains used are tiny by metro standards, at just three cars long. The smallness of these trains are compensated for by an extremely high frequency of often just two minutes between trains.

The system contains four lines, numbered from M1 to M4 as follows:

• The M1 and M2, The first pair of lines to open in 2003. Today, both lines begin service in the west at Vanløse, following a former S-Tog line to Frederiksberg before tunnelling under the city to Christianshavn where the lines branch out. The M1 emerges south and follows a largely elevated route to Vestamager, while the M2 goes south east at ground-level to Copenhagen Airport.
• The M3, also known as the Cityringen, is a fully-underground line that opened in 2019. As the name suggests, it is a circular line that runs around the city center.
• The M4 is a supplementary line to the M3, opening in 2020. Service starts at Orientkaj, before joining with the Cityringen to share tracks between Østerport and its current terminus at Copenhagen Central Station. Currently under construction is a further extension that will once again branch off the M3 to travel south west, terminating at Ny Ellebjerg. The ultimate ambition of the M4 is to extend it further north, where massive new developments on reclaimed land are planned.

Future lines, which would largely orbit the city center, are currently under consideration. In the long-term, a metro project named the Öresund Metro is also in the plans, which would see the Copenhagen Metro expanded to the Swedish city of Malmo in order to relieve passenger traffic along the existing Öresund Link due to a forecasted increase in rail freight along that route.

The Letbane

The Letbane (Light Rail) is the newest addition to Copenhagen's urban railways, featuring an orbital tram line that runs north-south through the city's western suburbs, following the route of the O3 ring road for most of its length. It runs from Ishøj in the south to Lundtofte in the north, interchanging with a number of S-Tog branches as it does so. It is currently due to open in 2025.

A second Letbane line, which branches off the first at Gladsaxe Trafikplads and travels towards the city center via Tingbjerg and Frederikssundsvej, terminating at the Nørrebro S-Tog and M3 station, is also in the planning stages, with the eventual ambition of extending it through the city center to the major Metro and S-Tog interchange at Nørreport.

Other Railways

Denmark's national railway, the Danske Statsbaner (DSB), runs many commuter-oriented train services into Copenhagen on the mainline railway network, as is typical for most major cities. The most notable of these is the Kystbanen (Coastal Train), a line which runs from Helsingør in the north of Zeeland into Copenhagen, as well as the Øresundståg, a Swedish service that connects Copenhagen's central station to Malmö via the truly epic Øresund Link.

Lokaltog is a private railway operator that runs several non-electrified regional railway lines outside of Copenhagen, most notably to the north of the city around Hillerød.

Though not a rail line, the 5C bus line (branded as the Cityline) runs from Copenhagen Airport through the city center, alternating between terminating at Husum Torv or Herlem Hospital. This line is the busiest bus service in Scandinavia at 20 million annual passengers, and runs 24/7 with a peak hour service frequency of 5 minutes.