In about 1860, a committee was formed called the Notabeln des Glan- und Lautertales (Notables of the Glan and Lauter valleys), which was based in Wolfstein.

The committee sent a proposal to the Ludwigshafen-based headquarters of the Palatine Ludwig Railway Company (Pfälzische Ludwigsbahn-Gesellschaft).

[3] After the opening, in 1870, of the Alsenz Valley Railway (Alsenztalbahn), which at the beginning was seen as a route for long-distance traffic, the probability of a rail link via the Lauter dropped significantly.

It was decided to build the Lauter Railway as a secondary line and the plan for a branch to Otterberg was postponed.

Due to the expected heavy freight traffic at the original Kaiserslautern West station (Westbahnhof), the section to this station was designed as a main line railway, while the remaining section to Lauterecken was designed as a secondary line with lighter trackwork.

To the north of the original terminus at Lauterecken an additional halt (Haltepunkt) was built in the district of Veldenzstadt to give access for the residents at the northern edge of the town and to the central Glan valley.

[8] The opening of the branch to Otterbach in 1911, and the Bach Railway (Bachbahn, so called because all of its stations had names ending in “bach”, i.e. “brook”) to Weilerbach, which was extended in 1920 to Reichenbach, gave the Lauter Valley Railway greater importance, especially its southern stretch, since the passenger trains on either route often continued to Kaiserslautern.

[9] In 1922, there were plans for the stations in Kaulbach, Lohnweiler and Rossbach-Stahlhausen to close due to low use, but local protests prevented this.

In 1923 and 1924, so-called Regiebetrieb ("directed operation" of the railways by the Allied military during the Occupation of the Ruhr) was imposed under the control of France, which had occupied the Palatinate.

Therefore, reinforced German Post Office bus routes and private trucks were used as an alternative to the French-controlled railways.

In December 1944, Lauterecken-Grumbach station, due to its function as a railway junction, was the victim of a series of air raids, which among other things burnt down the roundhouse.

[13] After the Second World War Deutsche Bundesbahn (DB) took over operations on the line and incorporated them into the railway division of Mainz.

The latter received those sections controlled by the former railway division of Saarbrücken that were located within the newly created federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate.

In 1983, the Lauter Valley Railway celebrated its 100th anniversary with a Trans Europ Express service between Kaiserslautern and Lauterecken.

On 9 June 1986, Deutsche Bundesbahn and Rhineland-Palatinate entered into an agreement, which divided all the railway lines in the state into three categories.

In the following years the Lauter Valley Railway was threatened with closure, but the public and local politicians managed to preserve the line.

[17] On 20 August 1995, the first "car-free day in the Lauter valley" (Autofreies Lautertal) was celebrated with the reintroduction of Sunday services.

Also in 2005, the platforms at the stations of Olsbrücken, Lampertsmühle-Otterbach, Heinzenhausen and Wolfenstein were upgraded to make them accessible for the disabled.

[19] At the same time Deutsche Bahn, carried out a pilot project to install a system for controlling train operations by radio, but was unsuccessful.

In 1896, services were extended with the opening of the lower Glan Valley Railway to Odernheim and its extension to Staudernheim in 1897.

[23] After the Bach Railway and the line to Otterberg were opened for passengers, their trains ran mostly to Kaiserslautern, so the Kaiserslautern–Lampertsmühle-Otterbach section had increased traffic.

In 2000, during the State Garden Show in Kaiserslautern, the Karlsruhe–Kaiserslautern Regional-Express service was extended to Lampertsmühle-Otterbach to cope with the number of visitors.