Upgrading & Maintenance of Railway Embankment

The ZVS/BirdLife Zurich, Limmattal/Amt region has set itself the goal of upgrading the railway embankments along the S5 line in the coming years. The "Nature next to the tracks" project was launched for this purpose. Since 2016, various biodiversity projects have been implemented along the Aemtler railway line as part of this project. In a first phase, the reptile populations along the entire railway line between Zurich-Altstetten and Knonau were recorded. In the second phase, the railway embankments will now be upgraded, where possible, for the reptiles and the rest of the nature. This project is part of this overall project.

We are in the municipality of Schlieren. The railway embankment is on the edge of the Schlieren settlement and was used as sheep pasture until around 2012. Due to his age, the manager had to give up grazing and the area has been mulched in recent years without any consideration for small animals and particularly vulnerable plant species. The nature network was given the task of ensuring long-term maintenance access to the area, carefully mowing and haying the area once a year with a scythe mower, promoting old grass islands, creating green waste depots as egg-laying sites for reptiles, and building additional piles of branches and stones.

The work on the steep slopes was hard but enjoyable, especially given the hot summer weather. Small structures for lizards, snakes, mice and much more were created and old grass islands were left standing in the areas most worth protecting. We are already looking forward to the next maintenance work next year.