Darjeeling Himalayan Railway

New Jalpaiguri – Darjeeling
Route length:	86 km
Gauge :	610 mm ( 2 foot track )
Legend -4 ,? New Jalpaiguri (since 1962) 95.7m Broad gauge line 0.0 Shiliguri Town 121.3m Route until 1962 2.4 Shiliguri Junction 121.6m Broad gauge line to Kashanganj 11.7 Sukna 155.8m Reverse Loop 1 (1883-1991) 19.9 Rangtong 427.9m Hairpin 1 Kehrschleife 2 (1883-1942) Chunbati reversing loop 3 Hairpin 2 Hairpin 3 30.6 Tindharia 860.1m Hairpin 4 Reversing loop 4 Agony Point Hairpin 5 Gayabari Hairpin 6 Mahanadi 51.1 Course song 1476.5m 58.3 Tung 1708.7m 66.4 Sonada 1997.0m 76.0 Ghum 2257.7m Batasia reverse loop 5 81.7 Darjiling 2076.3m Darjiling Bazaar (dismantled in 1980)

The narrow-gauge railway Darjeeling Himalayan Railway ( Darjilingbahn , DHR) is a narrow-gauge railway of the gauge 610 mm (2 feet ) in India , of Shiliguri to Darjeeling leads and from the Indian state railway is operated. It is, like other Indian narrow-gauge railways, Toy Train (Engl. Toy train called).

route

The train passes a fruit shop on the side of the road

The railway line was built by the British colonial government between 1879 and 1881 and mostly runs along the roadside of Hill Cart Road. It overcomes an altitude difference of over 2,000 m over a length of 86 km. The route with the twelve stations leads over 554 bridges and through a single short tunnel. The mean slope is 44 ‰, at the steepest point 56 ‰. In addition, six double hairpin bends and three circular turning loops were built in at the points where the gradient of the road is too great and the train cannot therefore follow the road. Of the 873 curves, the narrowest has a radius of just 13 meters.

The trains take 6 1/2 hours for the entire route, and sometimes 10 hours in the event of delays. Often landslides make the tracks impassable, so that means of transport have to be changed along the way.

In the towns along the route, the track is usually in the street, so that the trains often pass houses and market stalls with a few centimeters apart. The diesel locomotives are equipped with a very loud horn that clearly drowns out the horns of Indian trucks.

In the monsoon season of 2010, a landslide spilled the stretch along with the parallel road at km 50 near Pagla Jhora between Mahanadi and Gayabari . Another landslide at Tindharia interrupted the route in September , followed by another in July 2012.

Operations resumed as far as Gayabari in early 2014. For the time being, the DHR only operated on the sections Darjeeling – Kursong with two daily pairs of trains, mostly diesel-hauled, and Chunbati – Shiliguri Junction with the daily diesel-hauled jungle safari train; In addition, four pairs of steam-hauled trains ran daily between Darjeeling and Ghum for tourists.

Since December 2nd, 2015 there is again scheduled traffic on the entire route. A diesel-powered train runs from New Jalpaiguri to Darjeeling on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and in the opposite direction on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. In addition, three steam and three diesel trains run in each direction between Darjeeling and Ghum every day. The Red Panda steam train and a diesel train run between Darjeeling and Klassenong . The Himalayan on Wheels steam train runs betweenoursesong and Mahanadi . The Jungle Safari steam train runs between Shiliguri and Rangtong . All trains require a reservation.

Trains

To this day, the passenger trains between Darjiling and Ghum are hauled by steam locomotives, while trains that use the other parts of the route are hauled by diesel locomotives. In addition to the locomotive, passenger trains usually consist of three wagons: a baggage car, a car for the first class with brocade seats and one for the second, quite comfortable class. The tourist trains consist of two first class cars.

World Heritage

The track is since 1999 part of the World Heritage Site Mountain Railways of India of UNESCO . In addition to the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, this World Heritage Site also includes the Kalka-Shimla Railway and the Nilgiri Mountain Railway . When the Darjeeling Railway was not continuously passable for a long time, UNESCO threatened to withdraw the World Heritage Site if it was not repaired immediately.

Picture gallery

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  1999 course song

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  The toy train on the go

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  Train at Batasia Loop with the Kangchenjunga in the background.

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  A railroad worker sets the points at a hairpin

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  Class D locomotive , in service from 1911 to 1954

literature

• Anthony Coulls: Railways as World Heritage Sites = Occasional Papers of the World Heritage Convention. ICOMOS 1999, p. 17ff.
• Günter Krause: Tea in the world cultural heritage. Travel impressions from the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway. In. EisenbahnGeschichte 39 (2010), pp. 58–61. (With route map)
• Terry Martin: Halfway to Heaven - Darjeeling and its remarkable railway. Rail Romances, Chester 2000, 1-900622-03-3.
• Terry Martin: The Iron Sherpa Vol. 1 - The history. Rail Romances, Chester 2006, ISBN 978-1-900622-10-3 .
• Terry Martin: The Iron Sherpa Vol. 2 - The route, locomotives, rolling stock and infrastructure. Rail Romances, Chester 2010, ISBN 978-1-900622-12-7 .

Web links

Commons : Darjeeling Himalayan Railway  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Wikivoyage: Darjeeling Himalayan Railway  - Travel Guide

• BBC film about Darjeeling Himalayan Railway on YouTube : [1] , length: 60 minutes
• Darjeeling Himalayan Railway Society (English)
• Matthias Manhart: Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (DHR). Retrieved May 2, 2014 (website with many pictures from 2009 to 2014). 

Individual evidence

1. ^ Toy Train Story Darjeeling Himalayan Railway. Darjeeling Tourism, accessed January 14, 2014 . 
2. ↑ Pagla Jhora landslide, Klassenong: June 16, 2010. Retrieved January 14, 2014 . 
3. ↑ Tindharia-Siliguri toy train service to resume by month-end. The Hindu, December 16, 2013, accessed January 14, 2014 . 
4. ↑ ^{a b} Timetable and Travel Information. The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway Society , April 12, 2016, accessed June 18, 2014 . 
5. ↑ Archisman Dinda: Darjeeling toy train may loose its heritage day. gulfnews.com , March 16, 2013, accessed March 17, 2013 . 

 Map with all coordinates: OSM | WikiMap