Gotthard Tunnel

Not to be confused with Gotthard Road Tunnel orGotthard Base Tunnel.TheGotthard Tunnel (German: Gotthardtunnel, Ital-

Entry to the Gotthard Rail Tunnel at Göschenen

Entry to the Gotthard Rail Tunnel at Airolo

ian: Galleria del San Gottardo) is a 15.003 km (9.322mi) long railway tunnel and forms the summit of theGotthard Railway in Switzerland. It connects Göschenenwith Airolo and was the first tunnel through the Gotthardmassif. It is built as one double-track, standard gaugetunnel.[2]

The tunnel rises from the northern portal at Göschenen(1106 metres / 3650 ft) and the highest point (1151 me-tres, or 3800 ft) is reached after approximately 8 kilo-metres (5 mi). After two more kilometers, the borderbetween the cantons of Uri and Ticino is passed; afteranother 5 kilometres (3 mi), the tunnel ends at the south-ern portal near to Airolo (1142 metres, or 3770 ft). Thetrip takes about seven to eight minutes by train. Servicesare operated by the Swiss national railway company SBB-CFF-FFS.

Workers in Airolo (1880)

Pneumatic locomotive with attached pressure container.[1]

Memorial for the dead workers

1 Construction

The tunnel was built from 1871 to 1881. Constructionwas surveyed by the Swiss engineer Louis Favre, who suf-fered a fatal heart attack inside the tunnel in 1879. Con-struction was difficult due to financial, technical and geo-logical issues, the last leading to the death of around 200workers (the exact number is not known) mainly due to

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2 6 EXTERNAL LINKS

water inrushes; many were also killed by the compressedair-driven trains carrying excavated material out of thetunnel. There were also serious health issues caused byan epidemic of hookworm infection.[3] A strike of theworkers in 1875 was crushed by the Swiss Army, killingfour and wounding 13.There is a memorial for the dead workers near the stationbuilding at Airolo, created by the artist Vincenzo Vela.

2 Operation

The tunnel was opened for traffic in 1882, operated by theprivate railway company Gotthardbahn, which ran fromLucerne to Chiasso at the Italian border. The Gotthard-bahn was integrated into the Swiss Federal Railways in1909. In 1920, the first electric trains were run throughthe Gotthard Tunnel. Initially the voltage had to be re-duced from the desired 15 kilovolts to 7.5 kV, because thegrime deposited on the insulators by the steam locomo-tives encouraged excessive arcing. However in May thenext year, steam was replaced entirely by electric tractionand the problem of soot and grime was eliminated.[4]

Until the opening of the Gotthard Road Tunnel, the SwissFederal Railways offered piggyback services for cars andtrucks through the Gotthard Tunnel. Today, that serviceexists as the Rolling highway from the German to the Ital-ian border and aims to reduce truck traffic on Swiss ex-pressways. An improvisational piggyback service fromGöschenen to Airolo was offered during the two monthsclosure of the Gotthard Road Tunnel in 2001.

3 Neighbouring tunnels

The nearby Gotthard Road Tunnel was opened in 1980.A second railway tunnel, the Gotthard Base Tunnel is cur-rently under construction with completion now expectedin 2016, having broken through in 2010.[5] The adjacentramps include several turn tunnels (see Table of turn tun-nels).

4 See also• Gotthard Base Tunnel

5 References[1] Braun, Adolphe: Photographische Ansichten der Got-

thardbahn, Dornach im Elsass, ca. 1875

[2] Eisenbahnatlas Schweiz. Verlag Schweers + Wall GmbH.2012. p. 34. ISBN 978-3-89494-130-7.

[3] Bibliography of Hookworm Disease

[4] Book: “Die Bahn durch den Gotthard”

[5] BBC News - Swiss complete world’s longest tunnel

6 External links• A map with the locations of Gotthard Rail Tunneland Gotthard Base Tunnel

• Gotthard Tunnel. Information about Gotthard Tun-nel (German)

This article includes a list of references, related readingor external links, but its sources remain unclear becauseit lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by in-troducing more precise citations.Coordinates: 46°31′44″N 8°36′09″E / 46.529°N8.6026°E

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7.1 Text• Gotthard Tunnel Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard%20Tunnel?oldid=638528963 Contributors: Arwel Parry, Docu, CCom-Mack, Jklamo, Chris j wood, Sladen, Dbachmann, Markussep, Retran, Jeltz, Will-h, Ae-a, YurikBot, Cate, Jaxl, Zwobot, Klaus with K,Sangramraje, ABACA, Audriusa, Coccodrillo, Frukt, Booksworm, Kabelleger, Cydebot, AndrewDressel, Electron9, Augusta2, Arsenikk,JAnDbot, Jahoe, Jllm06, The Anomebot2, Hugo999, VolkovBot, TXiKiBoT, Broadbot, Falcon8765, Roland zh, BotMultichill, Prillen,Sphilbrick, PipepBot, Sassf, B.Zsolt, Tony May, Zacharie Grossen, Addbot, Yobot, Lord Koxinga, ArthurBot, Xqbot, FrescoBot, RedBot,PasoAPaso, Rhymezz, Miracle Pen, EmausBot, DMChatterton, ZéroBot, ClueBot NG, Aaron-Tripel, Theodorrius and Anonymous: 16

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