The story
The Regionale Bahngesellschaft Kaarst-Neuss-Düsseldorf-Erkrath-Mettmann-Wuppertal mbH was incorporated on 8 August 1992 by its constituent cities and districts. The company is owned as follows:
35 %: city of Düsseldorf
20.0 %: city of Mettmann
11.8 %: Rhein-Kreis Neuss
11.6 %: Stadtwerke Neuss (the public transport operator and supplier of natural gas, district heating and water of the city of Neuss)
11.6 %: city of Kaarst
10.0 %: Wuppertaler Stadtwerke (the public transport operator and supplier of electricity, natural gas, district heating and water of the city of Wuppertal)
On 1 January 1998 Regiobahn GmbH took over the infrastructure of the railway lines from Neuss to Kaarst and from Düsseldorf-Gerresheim to Mettmann from Deutsche Bahn.
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From 24 September 1998, it renovated the western section and operated it as a regional line. Passenger services continued to be operated on the eastern section until 2 January 1999. The foundation stone for the new service was laid at Mettmann station on 13 March 1999.
On 26 September 1999 operations commenced on the route between Mettmann and Kaarst initially running hourly (at 60 minute intervals) and from 28 May 2000, running at 20 minute intervals.
On 7 November 2005, Regiobahn Fahrbetriebsgesellschaft mbH was incorporated as a company to hold the PSO train operations contract with Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Ruhr. Regiobahn Fahrbetriebsgesellschaft mbH is a company owned by 39% city of Düsseldorf, 26% Rhein-Kreis Neuss, 22% Mettmann district, 12,8 % city of Kaarst. It subcontracts the operations of the trains to Transdev Rheinland GmbH. Formerly, Rheinisch-Bergische Eisenbahngesellschaft mbH was a separate company from 1999 until 2006, when it was merged with Veolia Verkehr Rheinland, laterly becoming Transdev.
In December 2013, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia agreed to finance 33.7 million of 41.1 million euros to extend the railway from Mettmann Stadtwald to Wuppertal-Vohwinkel via a new connecting curve to the Wuppertal-Vohwinkel–Essen-Überruhr railway, including a new station at Wuppertal-Hahnenfurth/Düssel. On 13 December 2020, that extension opened.
From Wikipedia’s article on Regiobahn GmbH, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4