# Railways turned into roads



## verreme (May 16, 2012)

Does your country have any road that used to be a railway? There are many of them around the world, mainly tunnels, but also full alignments. Let's see if we can list some. The ones I know:

*Italy*

"Strada delle Gallerie", in Liguria, is a 9-kilometer long former railway that's been turned to a road. It features several long tunnels. Traffic is one-way, and it's regulated by traffic lights.

Street View

There seems to be little information on the history of this road in the Internet; perhaps some Italian forumers could help.

*France*

"Tunnel du Prado-Carénage" in Marseille was built in the 19th century as a railway tunnel for freight trains going from Prado station to the port of the city. In the 1990s, it was refurbished and turned into a double-decker road tunnel. It's 2.4 kilometers long and has a funky decor inside.










Street View

Tunnel du Roux, in Ardèche department, was built between 1911 and 1929 to be used by a railway that was never completed. It's now part of D160 road. At 3.3 kilometers, it's one of France's longest tunnels.

Street View

*Spain*

In 1908 a company named _Compañía de los Ferrocarriles Suburbanos de Málaga_ (FSM) opened a railway between Málaga and Vélez-Málaga. It was dismantled in 1968, and a short stretch briefly hosted the Eastbound carriageway of N-340:










(photo courtesy of forum user miliar, source)

Picture may have been taken here, but I'm not sure about it. The road is now MA-24 _autovía_, and the old railway/road is now a pedestrian walkway.

The next one was never used as a road. Officially. Unofficially, it was quite a popular mountain pass when the "regular" road was blocked.

Túnel de la Engaña is a 7-kilometer long tunnel that took 17 years to build, starting shortly after the Spanish Civil War, and was meant to be part of a railway to connect the Spanish Mediterranean Coast with the Cantabric one. However, like many other megalomaniac railway projects of the same era, it was cancelled way after construction has started due to it being deemed unprofitable, and the tunnel was left abandoned. During some years, it was used by trucks in winter when nearby Puerto del Escudo mountain pass was impassable. It never wore a road number, though. The roof collapsed some years ago somewhere in the middle of the tunnel, so it's now useless. For about 40 years, it was Spain's longest tunnel.

*Chile*

Túnel Las Raíces was built between 1930 and 1940. It was intended for it to be used by a railway linking the Atlantic and the Pacific, but this project was never completed. The only stretch of the railway that was actually built used the tunnel for some time, and after its demise it was dismanteled and refurbished for vehicular use only. Wikipedia says it carries 450 vehicles per day, which is quite a lot of traffic for such a remote region. At 4.5 kilometers long, it's Latin America's fourth longest road tunnel.

I guess there must be many more around the globe -and many of us would be very happy to learn something about them :cheers:


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## ChrisZwolle (May 7, 2006)

The Netherlands built a lot of regional railroads in the 1910-1920s and many were shut down by the 1930s because they were unprofitable and bus transport was cheaper. 

Several roads were built over former railroads, but it is almost impossible to identify them as such if you don't known the particular history. 

Off the top of my head, N348 Raalte - Ommen and N387 Kolham - Siddeburen were built directly across a former railroad. 

In Dallas, Texas, the Dallas North Tollway was build across a former railroad, which is seen in its narrow right-of-way.


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## Penn's Woods (Apr 8, 2010)

The Pennsylvania Turnpike was built, in part, on a railroad right-of-way. The railroad never opened, though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_Turnpike#History


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## Kemo (Jan 22, 2012)

Nakło nad Notecią, Poland - railway bridge turned to a road bridge: https://maps.google.pl/maps?q=nakło...=Kc-osj118Vp38jy-UPTLBg&cbp=12,163.81,,1,3.25
It has currently been demolished and a new road viaduct is being built.

Here a new alignment of DW627 is being build along the dismantled railway: https://maps.google.pl/maps?q=nakło...id=7WT5_CFhhReWO4TzigcjZQ&cbp=12,132.7,,0,3.4
This railway used to serve the nazi extermination camp in Treblinka. (Also note the concrete road - it was constructed by Germans during WW2 and has not been overhauled since then  )

Here - a railway turned into a bike path: https://maps.google.pl/maps?q=gości...=66CM8V0ll6wOFa0-OvxtKg&cbp=12,120.03,,0,6.61


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

One section of H9 in Switzerland was the last single track section of the Simplon railway to be doubled, in 2004: https://maps.google.ch/maps?saddr=Z...FeinwgIdgJx0AA&t=m&mra=mift&mrsp=1&sz=17&z=14

Tunnel de Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines alias Tunnel Maurice-Lemaire in France was initially built as a rail tunnel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_Maurice-Lemaire

Many regional railways/interurban tramways were built on the side of roads, and when these railways closed, their right-of-way was used to widen the road.

Some others were converted to bike paths, with a clearly visible rail origin: https://maps.google.ch/maps?q=Sanre...d=6lQZzukTcyd5Bz_Hgs6CWA&cbp=12,259.04,,0,0.6



verreme said:


> "Strada delle Gallerie", in Liguria, is a 9-kilometer long former railway that's been turned to a road. It features several long tunnels. Traffic is one-way, and it's regulated by traffic lights.


Some photos can be seen here: http://www.stagniweb.it/Foto6.asp?File=moneglia&Tipo=index&Righe=30 ("Tutte le foto su un'unica pagina" puts them all in a single page)


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## Utopian (Jul 22, 2009)

*The Netherlands*
A large part of the former Marne Railroad Line (Marnelijn) in the province Groningen is now provincial road N361. 









_Location of the Marnelijn (black), superimposed on the current map. Between Abelstok (wooded area west of Mensingeweer) and Ulrum, the provincial 
road (N361) was built on the route of the Marnelijn._
Source: wikimedia commons


*Short history*
Until the 31st of March 1922, people transport Winsum <-> Zoutkamp was done by horse drawn trams. On April 1st 1922, the railroad Winsum-Zoutkamp was openend. The total lenght of this railway was 18,7 kilometer. The stations of the villages at the line were all built in the same fashion.









_Wehe-Den Hoorn trainstation, demolished._ Source: www.marnegebied.nl ... _Leens trainstation, still exists as a police station._ Source: www.marnegebied.nl


Road traffic at that time was still using the old medieval roads, winding through the centers of the villages.
In 1938 the railroad was closed, and a busline took over passenger transport. During the Second World War however, petrol became scarce, so the 
railroad was put back in use as passenger transport again. This lasted only two years, in 1942 the rails were pulled out by the Germans,
and transported to the eastern front.

After the war, car usage increased magnificently in this part of the Netherlands, making the old network of roads outdated. So a new provincial road 
between Winsum and Zoutkamp, the N361, was partly built on the course of the old railroad tracks.

The remnants of the demolished railroad are still visible at some places. Notably the secundary road between Mensingeweer and Wehe-den Hoorn features a strange hump in the flat landscape: this was the place the railway crossed the old road. Also, the abbutments of a railroad bridge are visible nearby. 








Source: wikimedia commons


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## diablo234 (Aug 18, 2008)

The Overseas Highway (US 1) in the Florida Keys runs on the former Overseas Railroad right of way connecting Key West to the Mainland. The railroad was converted into a roadway after a hurricane in 1935 destroyed the railroad infrastructure. You can even see the old railroad bridges on many parts from the newer roadway.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_Railroad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_Highway


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## italystf (Aug 2, 2011)

North-East Italy: those marked in red were build as railways before WWII but they were never completed. They were rebuild into roads in the 1970s. Notice the very straight allignments.


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## italystf (Aug 2, 2011)

About the "Strada delle Gallerie" in Liguria: the Genoa-Pisa railway was completed in 1874 and in the 1920s a section of it was moved from the coast to the immediate interior. The former track was converted in a road.


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## Kanadzie (Jan 3, 2014)

Kemo said:


> Here a new alignment of DW627 is being build along the dismantled railway: https://maps.google.pl/maps?q=nakło...id=7WT5_CFhhReWO4TzigcjZQ&cbp=12,132.7,,0,3.4
> This railway used to serve the nazi extermination camp in Treblinka. (Also note the concrete road - it was constructed by Germans during WW2 and has not been overhauled since then  )


I like how you can see the tracks in the dirt on the side, people are thinking, maybe the random dirt is better than the pavement :lol:


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## Pepov (Jul 6, 2006)

Bypass of Kluczbork, Poland is former railroad.
https://www.google.pl/maps/@50.9676...m4!1e1!3m2!1syNiSZApI9GyhTiOcDUBviw!2e0?hl=pl


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## metasmurf (Nov 16, 2007)

*The Sulitjelma Line railway to road conversion, Norway*










http://goo.gl/maps/NSil1










The construction of the Sulitjelma Line railway began in May 1891 when the mining company in Sulitjelma decided to build a railway between Sjønstå and Fossen. The line was the first in Northern Norway. The mining products were then transported by barges on the lakes. In 1953, work began on extending the line from Sjønstå on the lake Øvrevatnet all the way to Finneid on the coast of the Skjerstadfjorden in the town of Fauske. The new extension would connect the line to the main Nordland Line in Fauske. The reason for the extension was that the lake barge transport had difficulties in the winter.

Due to the mountainous terrain, three tunnels were built, Grønnlifjell Tunnel, Hårskolten Tunnel and Sjønståfjell Tunnel, each with a length of 2,400 to 2,800 metres (7,900 to 9,200 ft). Operation of the line all the way to Finneid started in December 1956. Another new tunnel through the small Stokkviknakken mountain was opened on 30 November 1962. After this, the railway had a total length of 35.8 kilometres (22.2 mi).

The Sulitjelma railway line was closed down in 1972. The tracks were removed and the former trackbed was converted into a roadway, nowdays Norwegian county road 830. In 1991, all mining in Sulitjelma was stopped as the costs of extraction became greater than the value of the ore on the market. The remaining ore deposits still constitute the largest known deposit of copper in Norway.










The northern entrance to the Grønnlifjell Tunnel.

Info and pics from Wikipedia.


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## stickedy (Mar 8, 2011)

In Bosnia and Herzegovina the old East Bosnian Railway - narrow gauge - is used for the M5 (unpaved) between Prača and M19-3 near Rogatica: https://goo.gl/maps/pU8Wm










http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/M5_(Bosnien_und_Herzegowina)
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnische_Ostbahn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrow_gauge_railways_in_Bosnia_and_Herzegovina#East_Bosnian_railway


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## rower2000 (Dec 5, 2008)

In Alaska, the McCarthy Road uses the trackbed of the Copper River and Northwestern Railway, which was disbanded after the copper mining activities in Kennicott stopped. Quite a worthy drive, BTW!


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## friedrichstrasse (Jan 8, 2007)

verreme said:


> *Italy*
> 
> "Strada delle Gallerie", in Liguria, is a 9-kilometer long former railway that's been turned to a road. It features several long tunnels. Traffic is one-way, and it's regulated by traffic lights.
> 
> There seems to be little information on the history of this road in the Internet; perhaps some Italian forumers could help.


You can find some photos here


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## friedrichstrasse (Jan 8, 2007)

*Italy*

The Cremona–Iseo railway between Sesto Cremonese and Farfengo.

https://maps.google.it/maps?ll=45.185788,9.889637&spn=0.004106,0.010568&t=k&z=17&layer=c&cbll=45.185862,9.88938&panoid=20wn3IQfCBk4zHzomCUoRQ&cbp=12,283.22,,0,-0.64

https://maps.google.it/maps?ll=45.192277,9.872461&spn=0.004136,0.010568&t=k&z=17&layer=c&cbll=45.192277,9.872461&panoid=0TpQRqPH5ziIFs3XQa1MRA&cbp=12,2.69,,0,0

https://maps.google.it/maps?ll=45.205007,9.870709&spn=0.004135,0.010568&t=k&z=17&layer=c&cbll=45.205007,9.870709&panoid=4yq0EQ39r9Dh3hSX7fY_PA&cbp=12,357.2,,0,2.83


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## friedrichstrasse (Jan 8, 2007)

*Italy*

The Piacenza–Bettola railway between Ponte dell'Olio and Bettola.

Riva station

Biana station

Recesio station


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## riiga (Nov 2, 2009)

*Mellersta Östergötlands järnväg (Middle Östergötland railroad)*

Mellersta Östergötlands Järnväg (The Middle Östergötland Railroad) was a narrow-gauge railroad in use from 1897 until 1964. The rail remained in place far longer than that, and I think there are some parts were the rail is still in place.

It was electrified during the years 1908-1921, quite unusual for a privately-owned railway with narrow gauge.

The part Klockrike-Österstad (via Fornåsa) was converted to road, and part of the stretch north of Linköping was used when riksväg 36 (now 34) was built.









Fornåsa station in 1920.


Show in red is the former railway, in blue parts converted to road, and in yellow rail still used today.









Google Maps. More info (in Swedish). Wikipedia (in Swedish).


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## Fargo Wolf (Oct 23, 2009)

There are three locations in the Canadian province of British Columbia.

The first is Florence St in the community of Midway. The road follows the former VV&E railgrade from the village for some distance, before it heads off to the local dump, just before a tunnel.

Just west of the community of Keremeos, Ashnola Rd runs atop the railgrade of the same, former railway. On this road, is the famous local landmark, the Red Bridge which is the former railway bridge, now a road bridge. It was threatened with demolition when it needed major repairs to keep it open for traffic, but residents vigorously protested. The bridge was thoroughly repaired and restored.

http://goo.gl/maps/YJkgf

Lastly, The Crow's Nest Highway runs atop a former CP Railway alignment est of the Village of Elko. CP relocated to the opposite side of the river in the 50s (better alignment and reduction in grade) and, in 1957, the Provincial government used the former grade to build the highway. the tunnel was widened to accommodate two way traffic.


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## NordikNerd (Feb 5, 2011)

riiga said:


> Mellersta Östergötlands Järnväg (The Middle Östergötland Railroad) was a narrow-gauge railroad in use from 1897 until 1964. The rail remained in place far longer than that, and I think there are some parts were the rail is still in place.


A lot of the railway embankment from Linköping to Motala/Fågelsta/Ringstorp is still there. Some parts of it are private dirt roads other parts are public gravel roads. I drove the whole stretch from Linköping to Klockrike on a moped. It's not recommended to drive on private roads as I did.



























*Old railway embankment at Vårdsberg, Linköping*


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## MattiG (Feb 11, 2011)

*Hyvinkää-Karkkila, Finland*

The 44 km narrow gauge (750 mm) railway Hyvinkää-Karkkila was in use from early 1910's to 1967. The final reason for the collapse of the business case was the opening the highway 2 via Karkkila in late 1950's.










The rails were removed soon after the end of the traffic. A few sections of the former trackbed are still in use as local and private roads. A recent night ride recording on the Hunsala-Vaskijärvi section of 4.5 kilometers. The road is partly in a good condition, partly barely passable:


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## diablo234 (Aug 18, 2008)

The Anton Anderson Tunnel in Alaska was a railroad tunnel that was converted to allow both road traffic and train traffic. However since it is only one lane in each direction and since trains still use the tunnel you can only use it at certain times of the day making it inconvenient to use.



















https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portage_Glacier_Highway#Anton_Anderson_Memorial_Tunnel


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## aswnl (Jun 6, 2004)

Some roads on former railway-right-of-way in the Netherlands:
* N231 Aarlanderveen-Nieuwkoop-Nieuwveen-Amstelhoek
* N233/N320 Rhenen-Kesteren
* N264 Oeffelt-Gennep (bridge)
* N347 Goor - Rijssen
* N348 Raalte - Ommen
* N361 Dokkum - Morra and Ulrum - Wehe den Hoorn
* N378 Gasselternijeveen - Stadskanaal
* N387 Kolham - Siddeburen
* N440 Wassenaar -Waalsdorpervlakte
* N445 Leiden -Roelofarendsveen - Leimuiden
* Eindhoven - Aalst, Europalaan Valkenswaard
* busbaan Uithoorn
* Beach avenue, Schiphol-Rijk
* Spoorlaan, Drunen


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## MarcVD (Dec 1, 2008)

Afsluitdijk in the netherlands. Major causeway, 32 km long. Carries a 2x2 motorway 
today, but was originally planned for a narrower road and a 2-tracks railway, which
was never built. Later on the rail reservation was used to enlarge the road.


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## MarcVD (Dec 1, 2008)

In Belgium, abandoned railways and trams lines, along with river and canal 
embankments, are transformed into roads dedicated to slow traffic (pedestrians, cyclists,
and horse-riders). More than 1300 km are already available, for the south part (french
speaking) of the country. Map at http://ravel.wallonie.be/opencms/opencms/fr/parcours/carto


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## ElviS77 (Aug 3, 2007)

There are a few examples in Norway. The fv 38 in Kragerø runs through a former railway tunnel, there are pedestrian lanes along former railroads south of Fagernes and north of Skreia, both in Oppland county. If I'm not gravely mistaken, the Dale-Voss section of the E16 is also partly on a former railway. There are probably many more as well.


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