|
The Simplon Tunnel is a railway tunnel that connects Brig, Switzerland and Domodossola, Italy, through the Alps, but not under Simplon Pass itself. It is straight except for short curves at either end. It actually consists of two single-track tunnels built nearly 20 years apart. The first to be opened is long; the second is long, making it the longest railway tunnel in the world until the opening of the Daishimizu Tunnel in 1982. Work on the first tube of the Simplon Tunnel commenced in 1898. The Italian king Victor Emmanuel III of Italy and the president of the National Council of Switzerland Ludwig Forrer opened the tunnel at Brig on 10 May 1906. The builders of the tunnel were Hermann Häustler and Hugo von Kager. Work on the second tube of the tunnel started in 1912 and it was opened in 1921. ==History== Shortly after the opening of the first railway in Switzerland, each region began to favour a separate north-south link through the Alps towards Italy. Eastern Switzerland supported a line through the Splügen Pass or the Lukmanier Pass, Central Switzerland and Zürich favoured the Gotthard Pass and Western Switzerland supported the Simplon route. In 1871 the first line was completed through the Alps, connecting Italy and France with the Fréjus Rail Tunnel. On 1 July 1878, the Simplon Railway Company (French: ''Compagnie du chemin de fer du Simplon'', S) was created to promote the project; it merged in 1881 with the company Western Swiss Railways (French: ''Chemins de Fer de la Suisse Occidentale'', SO) to create the Western Switzerland–Simplon Company (French: ''Compagnie de la Suisse Occidentale et du Simplon'', SOS). The French financiers of the SOS were able to secure finance for the tunnel in 1886. The company considered 31 proposals and selected one that involved the construction of a tunnel from Glis to Gondo, which would have been fully in Switzerland. From Gondo it would have continued on a ramp through the Divedro valley down to Domodossola. At a Swiss-Italian conference held in July 1889, it was agreed, however, to build a nearly-20-kilometre-long base tunnel through the territory of both states. In order to secure credit for the tunnel, the SOS joined with the Jura–Bern–Luzern Railway to create the Jura–Simplon Railway (French: ''Compagnie du Jura–Simplon'', SOS). The participation of the Swiss government led to the signing of a treaty with Italy on 25 November 1895 concerning the construction and operation of a railway through the Simplon from Brig to Domodossola by the Jura–Simplon Railway. The route of the tunnel was determined by military considerations so that the state border between the two countries was in the middle of the tunnel, allowing either country to block the tunnel in the event of war. On 1 May 1903, the Jura-Simplon Railway was nationalized and integrated into the network of the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB), which completed construction of the tunnel. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Simplon Tunnel」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|