Other formats

    TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 3, Issue 3 (July 2, 1928)

Italian Railways under Mussolini

Italian Railways under Mussolini.

No portion of Europe has in recent times enjoyed such systematic railway development as Northern Italy, where the recent completion of the Nice-Coni railway, connecting the French Riviera with Piedmont, Lombardy and Central Europe, has given a fresh stimulus to Italian trade and agriculture.

The Nice-Coni line was one of the important works included in the rehabilitation plan of Signor Mussolini immediately after the close of the Great War. First place in this plan was given a new direct main-line connecting Naples with Milan, 520 miles distant, with a branch leading from Bologna towards Venice. This work is proceeding rapidly, and included in the construction is the piercing of the Apennine Mountains with a tunnel more than eleven miles in length. It is estimated that the tunnel section will be completed by 1930, and as the first page 20 section of the route—between Naples and Rome—was recently opened to traffic, the benefits of the ambitious rehabilitation plan of the Mussolini Government, so far as they concern the construction of new railway links, are already making themselves apparent.

The Naples-Rome direct railway has a total length of 135 miles, and is remarkable for its freedom from severe curves. Tunnels total a length of about 21 miles, with a 4 3/4 mile tunnel through Mount Orso. There are no level crossing whatever on the route, which is stone ballasted, with 39ft. rails weighing 87 1/2lb. per yard laid on wooden sleepers spaced 2ft. 6in. apart. It is the intention to electrify the whole of the line between Naples and Rome, and already coversion has been completed in the section between Naples and Villa Literno. The new direct route between Naples and the Italian capital reduces the railway distance between the two points by twenty miles, and has enabled a speedier service to be introduced.