(MACHINE TRANSLATED DANISH)
(Undskyld, at jeg slet ikke taler dansk.)
Hej, jeg skal studere på Københavns Universitet fra september 2026, og jeg leder efter steder, foreninger eller klubber for jernbaneentusiaster i København. Jeg kan ikke finde noget i studenterforeningen.
Inden jeg skal studere i København, er jeg (i øjeblikket) studerende i Nottingham, Storbritannien. Selvom universitetet heller ikke har en »jernbaneforening«, og jeg heller ikke er lokal der, kan jeg finde mange lokale ressourcer og historiske jernbaner i nærheden, fordi jeg taler flydende engelsk (selvom det heller ikke er mit modersmål). Men de fleste af mine forsøg på at finde et sted i København, der har med jernbanehobby at gøre, online resulterer i meget få hjemmesider (herunder denne og DJK), der er helt på dansk. Selvom jeg kunne bruge en oversættelsessoftware, kan jeg allerede forestille mig, hvor svært det vil være at deltage i dem personligt i fremtiden.
Jeg søger råd eller »skjulte oplysninger« for at flytte min jernbanehobby til et andet land. Og nogle råd om at lære dansk til brug for jernbanedokumenter eller nogle ressourcer, der er tilgængelige på engelsk.

Tak


English:
(I am sorry for not speaking danish at all.)
Hello, I will be a student of Copenhagen University from September 2026, and I am looking for some places, associations, or clubs for railway enthusiasts in Copenhagen. I can't find one in the student union.
Before studying in Copenhagen I am (currently) a student in Nottingham, United Kingdom. While the university does not have a "railway society" either, nor I am a local there, I can find many local resources and heritage railway nearby, because I can use English fluently (although not native either). However, my most attempts trying to find a Copenhagen-based railway hobby-related place online result in very few websites (including this and DJK) completely in danish. While I could use a translation software, I can already imagine the difficulty to attend them in person in the future.
I am looking for advice or "hidden information" to migrate my railway hobby to another country. And some advice on learning danish for railway document purpose, or some English-available resources.

Thanks

Welcome to Denmark! There are not as many associations as you might be used to from England. There is of course the big, national association DJK (Danish Railway Club). There are also smaller heritage railway focused associations like Nordsjællands Veterantog that maintains their locomotives in Græsted and Rungsted Kyst near Copenhagen. Blovstrødbanen is an old industrial narrow gauge railway for a brickworks which is now a museum railway, it is located in Allerød. Hedeland also has a narrow gauge railway with old rolling stock, that is near Hedehusene.
Most - if not all - information you can find online will be in Danish. The average age of members in these associations is somewhat high, but most Danes speak at least some English. You can try writing to their email address to ask if you can come visit one day.

There are also several model railway clubs with their own layouts in and around Copenhagen if that interests you.

Hello fellow student

I too will answer in English. You'll find that the vast majority speaks English in Denmark, so i have no reservations responding in it, as i believe just about everyone on this forum will be able to follow.

Regarding the lack of associations and clubs, you'll find that there is much fewer organised at Danish universities than in other countries. But it would be wrong to assume there is none; to the contrary, Denmark has very strong culture of voluntary association participation. A quick lookup reveals that in the whole of the UK there's 166.000 (The National Council for Voluntary Organisations, 2022) where as in Denmark, with our much smaller population, the estimate is 65.000 (Center for Frivilligt Socialt Arbejde, 2025). There's a saying which i will translate: "When two Danes meet they will shake hands, When three Danes meet they will establish an association". In fact, the right to "free/unrestricted associations" is establish in our constitution (§78) BEFORE the right to free public gathering and before the requirement to enlist for conscription. A proper formalised Danish association, has a right to suitable locales provided by the local municipality.

So regarding your goals, you should look for these clubs and associations in the general society, rather than as the beneficiary of universities and the like. Thus, they tend to be small, decentralized and with sparse marketing or branding.

However, you MUST NOT fear that the language barrier will be an automatic hindrance. As i previously stated, most Danes speak English well enough to hold a conversation. (And those who don't, would be older and likely proficient in either French or German). And as the Danish country is small, it is essential for Danes to speak more than a single language, and thusly we're fairly used to it. To the detriment of especially English speakers trying to learn Danish, as we have a cultural habit of switching to English.

What would help us support you, is if you could state more about your interest. That will likely result in usable answers sooner or later.

Othwerwise:

• DJK is a general enthusiast club, and the mother associations of several heritage railways or rolling stock associations, the closest one of those is north over Copenhagen at Blovstrød (link)
• West of Copenhagen, in the "multi-recreational" area of Hedeland (heathland), you'll find a A) narrowguage railway operating old farming and industrial equiptment IBK (link) and B) the minimal-guage railway of Brandhøjbanen (link), who operates 127 mm (5″), 144 mm and  184 mm (7 1/4″)
• In Greater Copenhagen, you'll find plenty of model railroad associations, a list of several is hosted at DJK (link)
• For more general enthusiasm, Facebook is the major social network to continue your searches

Thanks for your information. I am particularly curious about 'railway ferries' between Zealand, Fyn, Jutland, Germany, Sweden, and how back then railway timetables were planned in Denmark (they had to work around these ferries?), before all the bridges come into place.

Citat fra: kuayueren Dato 28/03-26, 02:06Thanks for your information. I am particularly curious about 'railway ferries' between Zealand, Fyn, Jutland, Germany, Sweden, and how back then railway timetables were planned in Denmark (they had to work around these ferries?), before all the bridges come into place.

They indeed had to be planned around the ferries. Between Zealand and Funen was easy enough, as the ferries were only used by the trains and operated by DSB, so in this case it was actually the ferries planned around the trains rather than the other way around. There's an article from The Danish Railway Museum in Odense, which has the 1974 InterCity timetable in it. This was the introduction of the InterCity system, with trains departing at the same minutes past the hour throughout the day.
https://www.jernbanemuseet.dk/nyheder/hvordan-en-maerkedag-for-50-aar-siden-forandrede-din-togrejse-for-altid/

InterCity and Lyntog (express trains) used the ferries, but there was also regional trains going to/from Nyborg and Korsør at either end, connecting with the ferries, where passengers then had to board the ferries on foot as a cheaper alternative.

Going to Sweden and Germany was a bit different, at least in modern times. The ferries were combined car and railway ferries. The ferries on Helsingør-Helsingborg primarily carried the night trains to Sweden and Norway, as well as Kustpilen trains, and some cargo. They were not as busy as the Funen to Zealand ferries, as it was generally faster and more convenient to take the catamaran ferries from Copenhagen to Malmö then a train from there especially after the X2000's were introduced in Sweden in the early 90's.
It's similar for the ferries to Germany they carried cargo and limited international trains, so it was easier to timetable the limited trains around the ferries. Usually the timetable allowed for shorter delays so that the trains could make the planned ferries, before the IC3's and ICE-TD's there was quite a big gap in the timetables as they had to do quite a bit of shunting on and off the ferries too.

Citat fra: Seb1995 Dato 28/03-26, 09:24They indeed had to be planned around the ferries. Between Zealand and Funen was easy enough, as the ferries were only used by the trains and operated by DSB, so in this case it was actually the ferries planned around the trains rather than the other way around.

It still had quite a lot of influence on the timetables, though. Because there was just one (passenger) ferry departure per hour, that ferry had to carry both an IC train, possibly a lyntog too, and foot passengers from a regional train. So the timetable HAD to be arranged such that all three arrived at Nyborg / Korsør roughly at the same time of the hour, with repercussions for the relative timing of different train categories all along the main lines.

Before the bridge-building spate in the 1930s, there were also several shorter crossings where you needed ferries (such as Jutland-Funen as mentioned by the OP, or Zealand-Falster). There were fewer trains back then, so the ferries generally went when the trains arrived. In those times, passengers generally boarded the ferry on foot; only freight cars were ferried across.

The ferry crossing also had considerable influence on rolling-stock design. In particular, the length of an IC3 unit was selected such that it would fit neatly on the ferry, and the "rubber nose" design is a direct consequence of the need for quick coupling and uncoupling that came from running trains with more units than would fit on a single ferry track.

The class MA "lyntog" stock (now long gone) was also explicitly designed for this, with power heads in each end and a pair of cab cars with a connecting gangway in the middle so the train could be split across two tracks on the ferry. This capability was also used to split the train into two parts for different destinations once it reached Jutland. If it hadn't been for the ferry crossing, it might have been more practical to run separate expresses for each destination all the way from Copenhagen.

At least in the later years with IC3 and ICE-TD the Rødby-Puttgarden ferries usually never waited for delayed trains because of their strict schedule and the high twice an hour frequency. The schedule is 45 minute for the crossing and 15 minutes to unload and load all the vehicles including the train. A very smooth operation. 

Citat fra: Henning Makholm Dato 28/03-26, 12:46The ferry crossing also had considerable influence on rolling-stock design. In particular, the length of an IC3 unit was selected such that it would fit neatly on the ferry, and the "rubber nose" design is a direct consequence of the need for quick coupling and uncoupling that came from running trains with more units than would fit on a single ferry track.[...]

Wasn't that also a deciding factor in the decision to use the UIC-Y design instead of UIC-X so they could fit more wagons onto an individual ferry track?

Citat fra: 1993matias Dato 29/03-26, 19:32

Citat fra: Henning Makholm Dato 28/03-26, 12:46The ferry crossing also had considerable influence on rolling-stock design. In particular, the length of an IC3 unit was selected such that it would fit neatly on the ferry, and the "rubber nose" design is a direct consequence of the need for quick coupling and uncoupling that came from running trains with more units than would fit on a single ferry track.[...]

Wasn't that also a deciding factor in the decision to use the UIC-Y design instead of UIC-X so they could fit more wagons onto an individual ferry track?

Exactly so.
In the 80's however DSB also aquired used UIC-X and a few UIC-Z, but at that time the IC-Ferries with greater track length had been introduced.

Hello!

If your inclination in the trains hobby is towards the practical side, restoration and operation of heritage trains, let me advertise a little for the preservation society that I am a member of.

 "Nordsjællands jernbaneklub" (North of Zealand Railway Club) is located conveniently near Copenhagen and also has a high level of activity.

The society is maintaining heritage steam and diesel train operations under the name "Nordsjællands Veterantog" (North of Zealand Vintage (= heritage) Train).

The society is, like all Danish heritage railway societies, fully nonprofit and volunteer driven, and prospective members are well received.

Nordsjællands Jernbaneklub maintains steam locomotives in the old locoshed in Rungsted Kyst station (located on the rail line between Copenhagen and Elsinore) and Diesel traction and rolling stock in the historic Græsted station (Located on the rail line between Hillerød and Gilleleje).

Our (slightly confusing) website has an auto translate feature top right hand side and email addresses for info under the heading "meet us".

https://veterantoget.dk/

Regarding the language gap, most younger Danes speak good English. Recently we had a member who was a student from the US, he and a relative rose to prominence in the society, the common interest will surely close the gap.

Regards
Hans