Köln Messe/Deutz station (called Köln-Deutz until November 2004, Colognian: , ) is an important railway junction for long-distance rail and local services in the Cologne district of Deutz in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is situated close to the eastern bank of the Rhine and connected via the Hohenzollern Bridge to Köln Hauptbahnhof, the city's main station, which is just a few hundred metres away. The Cologne Trade Fair () grounds are directly north of the station, hence the Messe in the station's name. The Stadtbahn station of Deutz/Messe is nearby and connected by a pedestrian tunnel. The station is a junction station, which has platforms on two levels: the high-level platforms are used by trains running in the east-west direction across the Hohenzollern Bridge to and from Köln Hauptbahnhof. The lower level (Köln Messe/Deutz tief) is used by trains running in a north-south direction bypassing the Hauptbahnhof from Köln-Mülheim station towards Troisdorf. It serves an important function in providing some relief for the Köln Hauptbahnhof bottleneck—some ICE services call at Köln-Deutz instead of Köln Hbf, eliminating the need for changing direction, while many regional trains from the west terminate here to prevent them blocking the Hauptbahnhof. History The current Köln Messe/Deutz station was developed from several predecessors built from 1845 and the basic structure of the current station was opened on 11 November 1913. It gradually replaced the four stations of the competing companies, the Cologne-Minden Railway Company (Cöln-Mindener Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, CME), and the Bergisch-Märkische Railway Company (Bergisch-Märkische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, BME). The reception building, a three-wing structure with a central dome, was designed by architect Hugo Röttcher and built in 1914. In anticipation of the building of a bridge, or at least a steam ferry, across the Rhine to the station of the Rhenish Railway Company (Rheinische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, RhE) at Trankgasse (at the south-eastern end of the current Hauptbahnhof) on the opposite bank with connections to Aachen and Antwerp, a terminus was completed as a starting point of the CME's line to Düsseldorf southwest of the present station near the Rhine on 20 December 1845. Two through tracks to the Rhine are also visible on old maps. The line was later extended via Duisburg and Dortmund to Minden, connecting to Berlin. In 1859, the station also became the starting point of the Deutz–Gießen railway, which was being built. At the same time, the first permanent bridge was built across