The Cape to Cairo Railway was an unfinished project to create a railway line crossing Africa from south to north. It would have been the largest and most important railway of that continent. It was planned as a link between Cape Town in South Africa and

Port Said Port Said ( ar, بورسعيد, Būrsaʿīd, ; grc, Πηλούσιον, Pēlousion) is a city that lies in northeast Egypt extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, north of the Suez Canal. With an approximate population of 6 ...

in Egypt.Railways of Congo
Shandong: XH Company Minning. 2020.
SKY Company. 2020. The project was never completed. Important parts which were completed have been inoperative for many years, due to wars and lack of maintenance by the former colonies. This plan was initiated at the end of the 19th century, during the time of Western colonial rule, largely based on the vision of

Cecil Rhodes Cecil John Rhodes (5 July 1853 – 26 March 1902) was a British mining magnate and politician in southern Africa who served as Prime Minister of the Cape Colony from 1890 to 1896. An ardent believer in British imperialism, Rhodes and his Br ...

, in an attempt to connect adjacent African possessions of the British Empire through a continuous railway line from Cape Town, South Africa to Cairo, Egypt.

Construction

The original proposal for a Cape to Cairo railway was made in 1874 by Edwin Arnold, then the editor of '' The Daily Telegraph'', which was joint sponsor of the expedition by

H.M. Stanley Sir Henry Morton Stanley (born John Rowlands; 28 January 1841 – 10 May 1904) was a Welsh-American explorer, journalist, soldier, colonial administrator, author and politician who was famous for his exploration of Central Africa and his sear ...

to Africa to discover the course of the Congo River. The proposed route involved a mixture of railway and river transport between Elizabethville in the Belgian Congo (now Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of the Congo) and Sennar in the

Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...

rather than a completely rail one. Imperialist and entrepreneur

was instrumental in securing the southern states of the continent for the British Empire and envisioned a continuous "red line" of British dominions from north to south. A railway would be a critical element in this scheme to unify the possessions, facilitate governance, enable the military to move quickly to hot spots or conduct war, help settlement and enable intra- and extra-continental goods trade. The construction of this project presented a major technological challenge. France had a somewhat rival strategy in the late 1890s to link its western and eastern African colonies, namely Senegal to Djibouti. Southern Sudan and Ethiopia were in the way, but France sent expeditions in 1897 to establish a protectorate in southern Sudan and to find a route across Ethiopia. The scheme foundered when a British flotilla on the River Nile confronted the French expedition at the point of intersection between the French and British routes, leading to the Fashoda Incident and eventual French retreat. The Portuguese considered an Angola to Mozambique railway to link west with east and produced the "

Pink Map The Pink Map (, "rose-coloured map"), also known in English as the Rose-Coloured Map, was a map prepared in 1885 to represent Portugal's claim of sovereignty over a land corridor connecting their colonies of Angola and Mozambique during the Scr ...

" representing their claims to sovereignty in Africa (to link Angola and Mozambique). Opposition to British rule in South Africa was settled after the

First First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...

and

Second The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds ...

Boer Wars (ended in 1902 but only incorporating its two states into the new Union of South Africa in 1910). Egypt has a rail system that, as early as 1854, connected

, Alexandria and Cairo, and now currently goes as far south as Aswan. In Egypt the railway is . After a

ferry A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi ...

link up on the Nile, the railway continues in

from

Wadi Halfa Wādī Ḥalfā ( ar, وادي حلفا) is a city in the Northern state of Sudan on the shores of Lake Nubia near the border with Egypt. It is the terminus of a rail line from Khartoum and the point where goods are transferred from rail to ferr ...

to Khartoum at the meter gauge; see

Northern Africa Railroad Development The Sudan Military Railway was a military railway constructed from Wadi Halfa to Abu Hamed during 1896–97 by ''Sirdar'' Horatio Kitchener in order to supply the Anglo-Egyptian army prosecuting the Mahdist War. It was the predecessor line for t ...

. This part of the system was started by Lord Kitchener in 1897 to provide supplies during his war against the Mahdist uprising. Further railway links go south, the most southern point being Wau. South Sudan became independent in 2011. The border between Sudan and South Sudan is closed, and the railways in South Sudan are no longer operational. Most of Sudan's railway network is in disrepair due to political turmoil and US sanctions. A Khartoum–Atbara railway service began running in 2014 after China provided equipment and supplies. Other railway services have been put into place in Khartoum and surrounding areas.

Missed completion

British interests had to overcome obstacles of geography and climate, and the competing imperial schemes of the French, Portuguese and Germans. In 1891, Germany secured the strategically critical territory of

German East Africa German East Africa (GEA; german: Deutsch-Ostafrika) was a German colony in the African Great Lakes region, which included present-day Burundi, Rwanda, the Tanzania mainland, and the Kionga Triangle, a small region later incorporated into Mozam ...

, which along with the mountainous rainforest of the Belgian Congo precluded the building of a Cape to Cairo railway. In 1916 during World War I British, African and Indian soldiers won the Tanganyika Territory from the Germans, and after the war the British continued to rule the territory, which was a

League of Nations mandate A League of Nations mandate was a legal status for certain territories transferred from the control of one country to another following World War I, or the legal instruments that contained the internationally agreed-upon terms for administ ...

from 1922. The continuous line of colonies was complete. The southern section was completed during British rule before the First World War and has an interconnecting system of national railways using the Cape gauge of . Construction started from Cape Town and went parallel to the Great North Road to

Kimberley Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to: Places and historical events Australia * Kimberley (Western Australia) ** Roman Catholic Diocese of Kimberley * Kimberley Warm Springs, Tasmania * Kimberley, Tasmania a small town * County of Kimberley, a ...

through a part of Botswana to Bulawayo. From this junction the link proceeded further north. The

Victoria Falls Bridge The Victoria Falls Bridge crosses the Zambezi River just below the Victoria Falls and is built over the Second Gorge of the falls. As the river forms the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia, the bridge links the two countries and has border post ...

with completed in 1905. The British Empire possessed the political power to complete the Cape to Cairo Railway, but economics, including the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

of the 1930s, prevented its completion before World War II. After World War II, the decolonisation of Africa and the establishment of independent countries removed the colonial rationale for the project and increased the project's difficulty, effectively ending the project.

Operating segments

Currently operational length is out of total . The operational status of sections of the railway is as follows: * South-western section: starting from Cape Town, passing through

and Mahikeng in South Africa, Gaborone and Francistown in Botswana, to Bulawayo in Zimbabwe. * South-eastern section: from

Port Elizabeth Gqeberha (), formerly Port Elizabeth and colloquially often referred to as P.E., is a major seaport and the most populous city in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is the seat of the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality, Sou ...

, passing through Bloemfontein, Johannesburg, Pretoria and Musina in South Africa, to Bulawayo in Zimbabwe. * South-central section: Bulawayo league to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, to

Livingstone Livingstone may refer to: * Livingstone (name), a Scottish surname and a given name. **David Livingstone (1813–1873), Scottish physician, missionary and explorer, after whom many other Livingstones are named Places *Livingstone Falls, on the Con ...

Lusaka Lusaka (; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Zambia. It is one of the fastest-developing cities in southern Africa. Lusaka is in the southern part of the central plateau at an elevation of about . , the city's population was ab ...

and Ndola in Zambia, to

Sakania Sakania is a town in Haut-Katanga Province, in the Congo Pedicle, in the far south of the Democratic Republic of Congo, near the border with Zambia. It is located at an elevation of 1278m asl, therefore it has a cool climate. Between 1935 and 1939 i ...

, Lubumbashi, Tenke, Bukama, Kamina, Kabalo and Kindu in the

Congo-Kinshasa The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

. ** Incomplete stretch from Kindu to Uvira in Congo-Kinshasa,

Bujumbura Bujumbura (; ), formerly Usumbura, is the economic capital, largest city and main port of Burundi. It ships most of the country's chief export, coffee, as well as cotton and tin ore. Bujumbura was formerly the country's normal capital. In late ...

and Kayanza in

Burundi Burundi (, ), officially the Republic of Burundi ( rn, Repuburika y’Uburundi ; Swahili language, Swahili: ''Jamuhuri ya Burundi''; French language, French: ''République du Burundi'' ), is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley at the ...

, Butare and

Kigali Kigali () is the Capital (political), capital and largest city of Rwanda. It is near the nation's geographic centre in a region of rolling hills, with a series of valleys and ridges joined by steep slopes. As a primate city, Kigali has been Rwa ...

Rwanda Rwanda (; rw, u Rwanda ), officially the Republic of Rwanda, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley of Central Africa, where the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa converge. Located a few degrees south of the Equator ...

, to Kampala in Uganda. * Central stretch: connects Kampala to Njeru,

Busembatia Busembatya, sometimes spelled Busembatia, is a town in the Eastern Region of Uganda. Location Busembatya is located on the northern edge of Iganga District. The town is located on the main Iganga–Tirinyi–Kamonkoli–Mbale Road. Its closest ...

Tororo Tororo is a town in the Eastern Region of Uganda. It is the main municipal, administrative, and commercial center of Tororo District. History Tororo was garrisoned by the Uganda Army's Air and Sea Battalion during the Uganda–Tanzania War ( ...

and Gulu in Uganda. ** Incomplete stretch from Gulu in Uganda to Juba and Wau in South Sudan. ** Dead end of Wau in South Sudan to

Babanusa Babanusa is a town in western Sudan. History In 1965, 72 Dinka civilians were massacred in the town by an Arab mob during the First Sudanese Civil War. Climate Transport It is a railway junction on the national railway network where the ...

, due to local wars (see: Babanusa-Wau Railway). * North-upper Nile stretch: connects

to Sennar, Khartoum and

in Sudan. ** Incomplete stretch of

in Sudan to Aswan in Egypt. * North-lower Nile stretch: connects Aswan to Luxor, Asyut, Cairo and

Benha Banha ( arz, بنها ; , ) is the capital of the Qalyubiyya Governorate in north-eastern Egypt. Between the capital of Cairo and the city of Tanta, Banha is an important transport hub, as rail lines from Cairo to various cities in the Nile Del ...

in Egypt. * North-western section: connects

to Alexandria in Egypt. * North-central stretch: connects

to Damietta in Egypt. * North-eastern section: connects

in Egypt.

Connection with other railway systems

Uganda railway

East Africa has a network of narrow gauge railways that historically grew from ports on the Indian Ocean and went westward, built in parallel under British and German colonial rule. The furthest string north was the Uganda Railway. Eventually these networks were linked, so that today there is a continuous rail connection between Kampala, Uganda, on

Lake Victoria Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. With a surface area of approximately , Lake Victoria is Africa's largest lake by area, the world's largest tropical lake, and the world's second-largest fresh water lake by surface area after ...

to the coastal cities of Mombasa in Kenya and

Dar es Salaam Dar es Salaam (; from ar, دَار السَّلَام, Dâr es-Selâm, lit=Abode of Peace) or commonly known as Dar, is the largest city and financial hub of Tanzania. It is also the capital of Dar es Salaam Region. With a population of over s ...

in Tanzania. Up to the break-up of the East African Community in 1977, these companies operated as

East African Railways The East African Railways and Harbours Corporation (EAR&H) is a defunct company that operated railways and harbours in East Africa from 1948 to 1977. It was formed in 1948 for the new East African High Commission by merging the Kenya and Ugand ...

, but operate today as different national companies.

TAZARA link

From Dar es Salaam, a 1,860 km rail link to Kapiri Mposhi in Zambia was built from 1970 to 1975 as a turnkey project financed and supported by China. This Tanzania-Zambia-Railway (TAZARA) was built to connect landlocked Zambia and its mineral wealth to a port on the Indian Ocean, independent from port connections in South Africa, a frequent rival economic competitor in the mining sectors or Mozambique, at that time Portuguese-controlled territory. Not intended in the grand picture of the Cape to Cairo Railway, the TAZARA fills a critical link. This connection uses the gauge of the southern part of Africa.

Benguela-Katanga link

In the city of Tenke, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, there is an interconnection of the Cape-Cairo Railway with the Katanga-Benguela railway linking it to the port of Lobito in Angola, on the Atlantic coast.

Kidatu connection

In 1998, a transshipment hub was built at Kidatu in southern Tanzania to connect the

metre gauge Metre-gauge railways are narrow-gauge railways with track gauge of or 1 metre. The metre gauge is used in around of tracks around the world. It was used by European colonial powers, such as the French, British and German Empires. In Europe, la ...

Central Line (Tanzania) with the

Cape gauge A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. Th ...

TAZARA line. This also shortened the distance.

Railway systems in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa

The railway is connected to the Mozambican, Zimbabwean and South African systems through the Beira-Bulawayo railway, the Limpopo railway and the Pretoria-Maputo railway, reaching the ports of Maputo and Beira.

Road

The

Court Treatt expedition Stella Maud Court Treatt, FRGS (née Hinds; 1895 – 1976) was a South African filmmaker, author, and adventurer who with her first husband Chaplin Court Treatt undertook the Court Treatt Expedition 1924–1926, the first successful attempt ...

, an attempt to travel from Cape to Cairo by road, was made in 1924 using two cars. The

Cape to Cairo Road The Cape to Cairo Road or Pan-African Highway, sometimes called the Great North Road in sub-Saharan Africa, was a proposed road that would stretch the length of Africa, from Cape Town to Cairo, through the Cape to Cairo Red Line of British Em ...

was planned to roughly connect the same countries. That plan was updated with the Cairo–Cape Town Highway plan, large sections of which are paved and passable.

In fiction

John Crowley John Crowley may refer to: *John Crowley (Irish revolutionary) (1891-1942), Irish revolutionary and hunger striker *John Crowley (author) (born 1942), American author *John Crowley (baseball) (1862–1896), American Major League catcher *John Crowl ...

's science fiction

novella A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian ''novella'' meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) facts ...

Great Work of Time "Great Work of Time" is a science fiction novella by American writer John Crowley, originally published in Crowley's 1989 book collection ''Novelty''. A story involving time travel, it concerns a secret society whose aim is to avert World War ...

'' features an alternative history in which the British Empire survived to the end of the 20th century and beyond, and the Cape to Cairo Railway was completed. In an early chapter the protagonist travels in comfort the whole route from South Africa to Egypt.

References

Sources

* * * Tabor, George, ''The Cape to Cairo Railway & River Routes'' (2003), London: Genta. .

External links

The trip from Cairo to Kenya in 1935

Rovos Rail luxury tours from Cape Town to Cairo

Lamu Nadapal map – 2012
* Its status as of 1922

* An interesting news story from 1924: [https://www.thetimes.co.uk/archive/article/1924-08-28/12/6.html?region=global#start%3D1901-12-31%26end%3D1939-12-31%26terms%3D%22Cape%20to%20Cairo%20Railway%22%26back%3D/tto/archive/find/%252522Cape+to+Cairo+Railway%252522/w:1901-12-31%7E1939-12-31/o:date/11%26prev%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/%252522Cape+to+Cairo+Railway%252522/w:1901-12-31%7E1939-12-31/o:date/103%26next%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/%252522Cape+to+Cairo+Railway%252522/w:1901-12-31%7E1939-12-31/o:date/105 ''Link''] {{DEFAULTSORT:Cape To Cairo Railway Rail transport in Africa British colonisation in Africa International railway lines History of Africa Unfinished buildings and structures Cecil Rhodes