High-speed rail in Switzerland consists of two new lines and three new base tunnels, including the world's longest railway and deepest traffic tunnel: the

Gotthard Base Tunnel , rm, Tunnel da basa dal Sogn Gottard , image = 20141120 gotthard-basistunnel02-wikipedia-hannes-ortlieb.jpg , image_size = 250 , caption = Turnout at Faido multifunction station , line = Gotthard Line , location = Switzerland (Uri, Grisons and ...

whose length is . Each of these tunnels have a technical maximum speed of , which is reduced, at least in the

and the

Ceneri Base Tunnel The Ceneri Base Tunnel (CBT, it, Galleria di base del Monte Ceneri) is a Swiss railway base tunnel in the canton of Ticino. It passes under Monte Ceneri between Camorino in the Magadino Flat and Vezia near Lugano; it bypasses the former high-a ...

to a maximal authorized speed of for ecological and economical reasons, while the normal operational speed of passenger trains is restricted to in order to accommodate the freight traffic, with the possibility to accelerate up to 230 km/h in case of delay.Axe nord-sud du Saint-Gothard
(

Swiss Federal Railways Swiss Federal Railways (german: link=no, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen, ''SBB''; french: link=no, Chemins de fer fédéraux suisses, ''CFF''; it, Ferrovie federali svizzere, ''FFS'') is the national railway company of Switzerland. It is usuall ...

website).

History

To address transalpine freight and passenger bottlenecks on its roads and railways, Switzerland launched the Rail 2000 and

NRLA The New Railway Link through the Alps (NRLA; german: Neue Eisenbahn-Alpentransversale, NEAT, french: nouvelle ligne ferroviaire à travers les Alpes, NLFA, it, Nuova ferrovia transalpina, NFTA), is a Swiss construction project for faster north� ...

projects.

Rail 2000

The first stage of the Rail 2000 project finished in 2005, included a new high-speed rail track between

Bern german: Berner(in)french: Bernois(e) it, bernese , neighboring_municipalities = Bremgarten bei Bern, Frauenkappelen, Ittigen, Kirchlindach, Köniz, Mühleberg, Muri bei Bern, Neuenegg, Ostermundigen, Wohlen bei Bern, Zollikofen , website ...

and

Olten Olten (High Alemannic: ''Oute'') is a town in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland and capital of the district of the same name. Olten's railway station is within 30 minutes of Zürich, Basel, Bern, and Lucerne by train, and is a rail hub o ...

with an operating speed of 200 km/h. The second stage of Rail 2000, still in project, includes line upgrades in the

Valais Valais ( , , ; frp, Valês; german: Wallis ), more formally the Canton of Valais,; german: Kanton Wallis; in other official Swiss languages outside Valais: it, (Canton) Vallese ; rm, (Chantun) Vallais. is one of the cantons of Switzerland, 26 ...

canton (200 km/h) and between

Biel , french: Biennois(e) , neighboring_municipalities= Brügg, Ipsach, Leubringen/Magglingen (''Evilard/Macolin''), Nidau, Orpund, Orvin, Pieterlen, Port, Safnern, Tüscherz-Alfermée, Vauffelin , twintowns = Iserlohn (Germany) B ...

and

Solothurn Solothurn ( , ; french: Soleure ; it, Soletta ; rm, ) is a List of towns in Switzerland, town, a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality, and the Capital (political), capital of the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland. It is located in the n ...

(200 km/h).

NRLA project

New Railway Link through the Alps (NRLA; german: Neue Eisenbahn-Alpentransversale, NEAT, french: nouvelle ligne ferroviaire à travers les Alpes, NLFA, it, Nuova ferrovia transalpina, NFTA), is a

Swiss Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina *Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses *Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss Internation ...

construction project for faster north-south rail links across the

Swiss Alps The Alpine region of Switzerland, conventionally referred to as the Swiss Alps (german: Schweizer Alpen, french: Alpes suisses, it, Alpi svizzere, rm, Alps svizras), represents a major natural feature of the country and is, along with the Swiss ...

. It includes three completed

base tunnel A base tunnel is a type of tunnel, mainly a Rail transport, railway tunnel, that is built through the base of a mountain pass. This type of tunnel typically connects two valleys at about the same altitudes. When originally constructed, classica ...

s several hundred metres below the existing apex tunnels, the

, the

Lötschberg Base Tunnel , line = Lötschberg Line , location = Traversing the Bernese Alps in Switzerland , coordinates = – , system = BLS, SBB CFF FFS , status = , start = Frutigen, canton of Bern, , end = Raro ...

, and the

. The NRLA also includes the

Zimmerberg Base Tunnel The Zimmerberg Base Tunnel (ZBT) is a railway tunnel under the Zimmerberg mountains in Switzerland. Phase I of the tunnel was opened to traffic during April 2003. The ZBT has been divided into two phases of work; as of 2020, only Phase I is ope ...

for which only Phase I has been completed, in 2003, with an operating speed of 160 km/h, and Phase II remains in project. NRLA project is building faster north-south tracks across the Swiss Alps by constructing base tunnels several hundred metres below the level of the current tunnels. The 35 km

opened in 2007 where

New Pendolino The New Pendolino is a class of high-speed tilting trains built by Alstom Ferroviaria ( Fiat Ferroviaria) for Trenitalia and Cisalpino. It is derived from a model developed for the Chinese operator Changchun Railway Company, and subsequently dev ...

trains run. The 57 km

opened on 1 June 2016. The 15 km

opened on 4 September 2020. However, the slow speed of lines between the NRLA tunnels (

and

to name but a few) means that the capacity of Zürich-Milan services will remain limited until the speeds can be increased, given the strong negative effect of mixed rail speeds on capacity.

Rolling stock

The fastest Swiss train is the SBB RABe 501 also named Giruno. It is operated by the

since May 2016. They can reach higher speeds than conventional trains on the curve-intensive Swiss network, however the top speed of 200 km/h can only be reached on high-speed lines. The French-Swiss co-operation

TGV Lyria TGV Lyria is the brand name used for TGV railway lines connecting France and Switzerland. Lyria is also a corporation that runs the service using the staff of the SNCF in France and Swiss Federal Railways (SBB CFF FFS) in Switzerland – ...

and German

ICE Ice is water frozen into a solid state, typically forming at or below temperatures of 0 degrees Celsius or Depending on the presence of impurities such as particles of soil or bubbles of air, it can appear transparent or a more or less opaq ...

lines extend into Switzerland, the ICE 4 regularly operates at a maximum of 200 km/h (between Olten and Bern), while the TGV never exceeds 160 km/h, due to the lack of a high-speed track between Basel and Zurich. The former

Cisalpino Cisalpino AG () was a railway company, referred to as CIS in timetables, operating international trains between Switzerland and Italy connecting Basel, Schaffhausen, Zürich, Geneva, Milan, Venice, Trieste, Livorno, and Florence. The company h ...

consortium owned by the Swiss Federal Railways and

Trenitalia Trenitalia is the primary train operator in Italy. A subsidiary of Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, itself owned by the Italian government, the company was established in 2000 following a European Union directive on the deregulation of rail transp ...

used

Pendolino Pendolino (from Italian ''pendolo'' "pendulum", and ''-ino,'' a diminutive suffix) is an Italian family of tilting trains used in Italy, Spain, Germany, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Finland, Russia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the UK, the US, ...

tilting trains on two of its international lines. These trains are now operated by the Swiss Federal Railways and Trenitalia.

Network

References