Bologna – Florence railway line

Bologna – Florence
Route number (RFI) :	88 (Bologna – Prato) 94 (Prato – Florence)
Course book series (IT) :	46
Route length:	97 km
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system :	3 kV  =
Legend from Verona / Milan / Pistoia from Padua 96 + 908 Bologna Central 45 m to Ancona 92 + 695 Bologna Mazzini since 2013 90 + 490 Bologna San Ruffillo 90 m 88 + 000 Rastignano since 2004 83 + 018 Musiano-Pian di Macina since 2009 80 + 702 Pianoro 169 m Monte Adone (7111 m) 71 + 543 Monzuno -Vado 175 m 61 + 397 Grizzana 176 m Pian di Setta (3052 m) 56 + 288 San Benedetto Sambro - Castiglione Pepoli 317 m 55 + 742 Grande Galleria dell'Appennino (18507 m) 46 + 848 PC Precedenze 37 + 235 36 + 892 Vernio - Montepiano - Cantagallo 258 m 26 + 514 Vaiano 152 m from Pistoia 16 + 386 Prato Centrale 65 m 12 + 555 Calenzano 56 m 11 + 025 Pratignone since 1988 9 + 040 Il Neto since 1988 7 + 992 Sesto Fiorentino 54 m 6 + 588 Zambra since 1990 5 + 372 Firenze Castello 54 m 2 + 766 Firenze Rifredi 55 m from Rome (SFS) / from Rome 0 + 000 Firenze Santa Maria Novella 48 m

The Bologna – Florence line is an Italian line and one of the most important connections in the Italian rail network.

history

planning

In 1864 the Porrettana Railway was opened between Florence and Bologna via Pistoia and Prato . It quickly became apparent that this route across the Apennines was not sufficient for the considerable traffic demands.

Many drafts of further railway lines across the Apennines were presented and at the same time the plans for the Pontremoli Railway and the Faenza- Florence railway line were implemented. However, due to the topographical conditions in the Apennines, all projects had in common an extraordinarily curvy route with small curve radii, which could only be carried out on a single track. In addition, the railway operations on the realized connections had to cope with major weather-related difficulties in winter due to the high peak of the line.

In 1902 a new committee of experts was convened to advise on alternative route proposals for a fast and weather-independent direct connection Florence-Bologna. Finally, a plan drawn up in 1882 by the engineer Jean Louis Protche , who had already designed the Porrettana railway , was brought out again. For the implementation of this project, the Direttissima Florence – Bologna , the Italian government provided 150 million lire in 1908.

Construction and opening

The work lasted from 1913 to 1934 and was temporarily interrupted due to the First World War. The construction of the 18.5 km long Apennine Base Tunnel alone took 11 years. Numerous fatal accidents occurred on the construction sites, especially at the main tunnel, and many workers later developed silicosis . However, the construction of the Direttissima brought new jobs to the poor mountain landscape, which has so far been dominated by agriculture.

The line was inaugurated on April 22, 1934. It was portrayed as a glorious technical achievement for Italy and was a significant turning point in the history of connections, just like the Porrettana Railway 70 years earlier.

Remarkable structures

The 18.49 km long Apennine base tunnel Galleria dell'Appennino was for a long time the second longest tunnel and the longest single-tube double-track tunnel in the world, almost 1,300 meters shorter than the twin-tube Simplon tunnel , and is still one of the 20 longest rail tunnels today.

With the 7.1 km long Monte Adone Tunnel there is another railway tunnel of remarkable length on the Direttissima Florence – Bologna .

Parallel connections

Connection via Pistoia

The Direttissima was from the beginning double track , running with wide curves and fast to be traversed links to multiple connecting lines. With the opening of the new connection, the Florence – Bologna route was shortened from 131 to 91 km by bypassing Pistoia . At the same time, the maximum gradient compared to the existing connection was reduced from 26 to 13 per thousand and the apex was relocated from 615 to 322 meters above sea level, which made it possible to increase the maximum speed from 75 km / h to 180 km / h.

The travel time between Florence and Bologna on the Porrettana railway via Pistoia was five hours in 1864 and was shortened to three hours after the First World War . After electrification in 1927, the travel time could be reduced to 2.5 hours. After the opening of the Direttissima , the route Florence – Bologna could be covered in one hour and 25 minutes. Today the journey time is one hour.

Bologna – Florence high-speed line

Since the Direttissima, which was originally created to accelerate and expand capacity, no longer meets the requirements of high-speed traffic, since 1996 another connection between Florence and Bologna has been built southeast of the two existing routes with the high-speed route Bologna-Florence . It was completed in 2009.

Operational incidents

• During the Second World War, partisans blew up a military train that was parked on the siding of the Precedenze tunnel station in the Appeninnen base tunnel .
• On April 15, 1978, near the Monzuno-Vado train station , a local train in the direction of Bologna derailed . Its locomotive then protruded into the clearance profile of the opposite track, on which an express train from Venice to Rome drove into the derailed train and also derailed. Numerous passenger cars slid down an embankment. 47 people died and around 200 were injured.
• On December 23, 1984, 17 people died in the bomb attack in the Apennine base tunnel on Rapido 904, and 267 were also injured.

literature

• W. Viesewr: The new Florence-Bologna railway line. In: Die Bautechnik , 5th year, issue 52 (December 2, 1927), pp. 756–758.
• Werner Hardmeier, Ascanio Schneider: Direttissima Italy. The high-speed lines Bologna – Florence and Florence – Rome . Orell Füssli Verlag, Zurich 1989, ISBN 978-3-280-01817-0 .

Web links

• "Engineering Marvels of the Bologna-Florence Direttissima Route"

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bolognese suburbana. In: I Treni No. 265 (December 2004), p. 4.
2. ^ Impianti FS. In: I Treni No. 322 (January 2010), pp. 6-7.
3. ^ Galleria della Direttissima Vado-Pianoro | March 15, 1944 ( Memento of the original from December 16, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
4. ^ Peter WB Semmens: Catastrophes on rails. A worldwide documentation. Transpress, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-344-71030-3 , p. 185.