Another main line, the Salzburg-Tyrol railway, heads from Salzburg Hbf in a southerly direction via Bischofshofen and Zell am See to Wörgl Hauptbahnhof.

Also located at the station is one of the key hubs in the StadtBus Salzburg trolleybus system and city bus network.

Until 1957, a local railway station in the Salzburg Hbf forecourt was the departure point for the narrow gauge Salzkammergut-Lokalbahn, commonly known as the Ischlerbahn, to Mondsee and Bad Ischl.

Following the construction of further rail links, culminating in the Tauern Railway to Villach and on to Trieste in 1909, the station increased in importance as a transport hub.

In 1944 and 1945, the final years of World War II, the station and its network of tracks was the target of numerous bombing raids by American naval aircraft.

In 2003, an unsuccessful defusing of a 250-pound (110 kg) bomb even cost two explosives experts their lives, and in July/August 2007, the ÖBB carried out a search for further unexploded ordnance.

An underground extension of this railway as a U-Bahn or Stadtbahn line into or through the city centre was planned, and remains an option.

The shopping mall extended under all of the railway lines, from Südtirolerplatz to the north right through to the station's rear or southern side.

However, the actual construction project, which was essential to the station's future as a node for both long distance and local transport services, was consistently delayed.

Eventually, the competent authority ended the dispute, by approving the marble hall's demolition, under the city's proposed conditions.