Gornergrat Railway

Interesting facts

Work on the line began in 1896, only five years after the Visp–Zermatt railway first connected Zermatt to the Rhône valley.

Its three-phase system uses two overhead wires, with the running rails acting as the third conductor; only four lines in the world work this way.

The track is 9,339 metres long, including 3,790 metres of double track, and it gains about 1,469 metres in height.

Year-round service came in two steps: to the lower section in 1929, and all the way to the summit in 1941.

Running two-car trains, the railway can carry about 2,500 passengers an hour from Zermatt up to the ridge.

Besides passenger stops, the line has freight-only sidings at Findelbach and Riffelboden.

In the late 1960s two astronomical observatories were installed in the towers of the Kulmhotel beside the summit station.

Those towers later housed the Gornergrat Infrared Telescope and the KOSMA telescope, which ran there until 2005 and 2010.

An unpowered track connection in Zermatt links the line to the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn, used for freight and for delivering new rolling stock.

Why it is worth it

The Gornergrat Railway climbs from the resort village of Zermatt, at about 1,604 metres, to a station at 3,089 metres on the Gornergrat ridge, facing one of the grandest mountain panoramas in the Alps. Opened on 20 August 1898, it was the first electric rack railway in Switzerland and the highest railway in Europe until the Jungfrau line opened in 1912; it remains the highest open-air line on the continent. Its trains are still powered by three-phase current, which is why each carries two pantographs under a pair of overhead wires, a system used on only a handful of lines in the world.

The line is a little over 9 km long, built to metre gauge with the Abt rack system and gradients of up to 20 percent. It crosses the Findelbach on a viaduct, threads short tunnels and a long avalanche gallery above Riffelboden, and stops at Findelbach, Riffelalp, Riffelberg and Rotenboden on the way up. Rotenboden is the stop for the small Riffelsee lake just below the line. At first the trains ran only in summer; winter service reached the summit in the early 1940s, once the avalanche gallery had been completed.

At the top, the view takes in 29 peaks above 4,000 metres, the Monte Rosa massif, the Gorner Glacier, among the longest in the Alps, spilling down below, and, on a clear day, the Matterhorn. The summit station has a hotel and an observatory, and the ridge is a starting point for high walks in summer and skiing in winter.

Getting there

The line starts in Zermatt, opposite the station of the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn, whose trains run up the valley from Visp in the Rhône valley. The nearest airport by straight-line distance is Turin (TRN), about 90 km away across the main chain of the Alps; the nearest Swiss airport is Bern (BRN), about 100 km. From either, the last stage is by train up the valley to Zermatt.

From the encyclopaedia

The Gornergrat Railway is a mountain rack railway, located in the Swiss canton of Valais. It links the resort village of Zermatt, situated at 1,604 m (5,262 ft) above mean sea level, to the summit of the Gornergrat. The Gornergrat railway station is situated at an altitude of 3,089 m (10,135 ft), which makes the Gornergrat Railway the second highest railway in Europe after the Jungfrau, and the highest open-air railway of the continent. The line opened in 1898, and was the first electric rack railway to be built in Switzerland. The Gornergrat is a starting point for many hikes, as it lies surrounded by 29 peaks rising above 4,000 m (13,123 ft) in the Alps and several glaciers, including the Gorner Glacier. At the end of the line on Gornergrat, the Matterhorn is visible on a clear day. It is also a popular skiing area.

Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Gornergrat Railway

Interesting facts

Why it is worth it

Getting there

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From the encyclopaedia