In this final part we can visit the Mattertal Line which takes the Glacier Express to its terminus at Zermatt, and I am also going to write about why I decided to publish the article series. The publication of such has been rather drawn out over this past month, to a degree unpredicted when I began writing.
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The final section of the journey of the Glacier Express begins at Brig with the Brig-Visp-Zermatt-Bahn. As you can see with the updates to the map above, it shows how the railway has changed at Brig, the old section on the north side of the river through Naters being closed recently in favour of a direct link on the south side. Brig is also the junction for the Simplon line to Geneva and Lausanne, the Milan-Domodosolla line to Italy via the Simplon Tunnel, and the Lötschberg line to Bern. The latter has been largely supplanted by the recently opened Lötschberg Base Tunnel, like Furka-Basistunnel at a much lower level, but is still operated with hourly express trains. Although the MGB owns both of the Brig-Visp-Zermatt-Bahn and the Furka-Oberhardt-Bahn since the two merged to make the MGB in 2003, the lines are considered to also junction at Brig.
Heading west from Brig the line is on the south side of the Rhone River. The valley is very steep on the north bank but flat on the south to begin with up to a width of 1 km. At Gamsen the valley is narrowing in. After 9 km we are coming to Visp having dropped only 20 metres in that distance. This is also a junction of lines and one of them was opened in 1891 as the Visp-Zermatt-Bahn, sometimes called the Mattertal Line.
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| You can see that the BVZ has to make a sharp 90 degree turn at Visp (650 m, 35 km) in order to head south into the Matter Valley (Mattertal) which has the River Vispa at its base. The lines you can see exiting west are the Simplon line and the Neue Eisenbahn-Alpentransversale which is the deviation of the Lötschberg Line via Lötschberg-Basistunnel. The original Lötschberg route is on the north side of the Rhone. | As the BVZ heads up the Mattertal the terrain is flat and open at first but very soon begins to climb as the valley narrows. We can understand that the gradients will become rather severe when the line has to ascend some 1000 metres of altitude to Zermatt in a track distance of just 35 km. Naturally this is achieved by means of the Abt rack and the maximum incline is about 1 in 8. As we reach Staldbach we are passing under a bridge that links two A9 motorway tunnels under construction (not shown on Google Earth at the time of writing). |
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Soon after Ackersand (698 m, 29 km), the line crosses the Vispa on a concrete bridge and begins the first rack section, climbing quickly to Stalden (799 m, 28 km). The rack continues a little past Stalden and then the line goes on plain track through several tunnels before crossing the Mühlebachviadukt, which is 67 metres long and 43 metres high. There are several more tunnels before reaching Kalpetran (897 m, 24 km).
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About 1 km further on is another bridge over the Vispa; the 146 metre Kipfenbrücke, which has had to be rebuilt several times after being destroyed by avalanches. The current bridge is downstream from the location that Google Earth showed at time of writing and was opened 2007. Thereafer another rack section lasts for the Kipfenschlucht section, the most scenic on the line albeit the most susceptible to damage from avalanches and flooding on numerous occasions. At the end the line crosses the Sellibrücke and then enters the widening valley near St Niklaus.
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Here we see the 75 metre Sellibrücke at the top of the frame and towards the bottom the Jungbachgalerie, a kind of tunnel. The description in Wikipedia for the Blattbachtunnel appears to be more appropriate for the Jungbachgalerie which is not mentioned at all.
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Another rack section after St Niklaus (1126 m, 19 km) takes the line up through the
Blattbachtunnel which according to Wikipedia is an avalanche protection structure that replaced a bridge. You can understand easily the potential for avalanches with the extremely steep valley side which rises 1000 metres very rapidly.
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After the Blattbachtunnel comes the 31 metre Mattwaldbrücke taking us back across the Vispa. At Mattsand (1230 m, 15 km) the line passes a hydropower reservoir.
Past Breitmatten the line is deviated to go around the Randa landslide, which in 1991 buried 250 metres of the track causing it to be closed for 105 days. In order to traverse the deviation a fourth section of rack is required. The line then reaches Randa (1405 m, 10 km).
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After passing Täsch (1437 m, 6 km) the line crosses the Täschsandbrücke bridge just in advance of which the final section of Abt rack starts. Due to being prone to damage from natural events a high level of track protection structures cover the remaining length.
The rack ends at Kalter Boden (1539 m, 3 km) from which we can deduce the average grade on this last rack section is around 1 in 10. The crossing loop is sandwiched between two avalanche protection shelters (or Galerie).View Larger Map
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At the approach to Zermatt the line passes through the Lugelwang-Galerie and then the short Spissfluhtunnel takes it under the heliport.
Finally on the outskirts of Zermatt the line is taken through the Schafgrabengalerie; the sidings next to it cannot be used much in winter since they are not covered. Then the terminus is reached at 1605 metres altitude.
And that is a very extensive series of articles, the most extensive description I have ever given of 291 km of railway line.
- Why was the series written? I first read about the Glacier Express in a newspaper article in New Zealand. Once I started to look it up in Google Earth my interest was further provoked by the geographical features such as the numerous spirals in the Albula Railway section. This led to me writing these articles.
- Was the writing challenging? Yes it was, because once I delved into the details of the lines it became quite time consuming to pick out and document the physical features of the lines. The Glacier Express is rightly awarded the accolade of one of the world’s great train journeys, and that is because of the many construction feats which have had to be overcome.
- How is the route of the Glacier Express different from railways in New Zealand? Here in New Zealand we have a much lower population density meaning that our long narrow country of two main islands does not have enough people moving around it to justify the kind of railway building that has been undertaken in European countries to get lines over or under mountain passes, nor does it have great mountain ranges that are difficult to cross. The three longest tunnels in the entire country are each around 8 km in length. What passes for mountain resorts in NZ are so small as not to demand railway access and there are very limited cableways. There is not even any high speed passenger services anywhere in the country.
- Would you write again about spectacular railway journeys in Europe? Yes, but not for a good while, because writing this has taken so much of my time.
- Credits:
- Wikipedia, especially
- http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kehrtunnel#Wendetunnel_.28Kehr-_und_Spiraltunnel.29 (Translation available in Google Chrome)
- http://map.schweizmobil.ch/?lang=en (SwitzerlandMobility topo maps)
- And of course NZ Rail Maps http://www.trainweb.org/nzrailmaps/
