Basic Tunnel of Furka

The basic Tunnel of the Furka is a tunnel of railroad of 15,35 km between Oberwald (canton of the Valais, 1368 meters of altitude) and Realp (canton of Uri, 1538 meters). The tunnel replaces the way of summit mountain of Furka (from now on borrowed by the historical trains of the railroad of Furka), which culminates with 2160 meters.

The way metric and is electrified in 11kV 16Hz 2/3. Tunnel belongs to Matterhorn-Gotthard-Bahn (MGB), which exploits tunnel during all year, which was not possible when the train borrowed the coll Indeed important snowfalls and large risks of avalanches, which led even the engineers to invent a dismountable bridge (the Pont of Steffenbach) in order not to see it carrying by a casting, prohibited all circulations of trains during the period winter.

After a serious accident which has occurred in June 1963 with a snow-plow, one sought another solution to connect the canton of the Valais to the canton of Uri. The estimate of the tunnel then rose to 76 franc million. An alternative consisted in building a junction since the medium of the tunnel towards the Tessin, but she will never be born.

Following ceaseless problems at the time of the phase of construction, the total costs of the tunnel explode to go finally to height of 300 franc million. At the time of its construction, the polemic was sharp around this often qualified project of " pit with millions". The tunnel was finally inaugurated on June 15th, 1982.

It is borrowed by the Glacier Express train and regional trains circulating between Brig and Andermatt. A system of Ferroutage for the light vehicles was set up between Oberwald and Realp.

Internal bond

List of the tunnels

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