Blonay – Chamby railway line

Blonay – Chamby
Map of the route
Timetable field :	115 and 115.1
Route length:	2.95 km
Gauge :	1000 mm ( meter gauge )
Power system :	900 volts  =
Maximum slope :	50  ‰
Legend by Vevey 0.00 Blonay 620 m to Les Pléiades after Clarens 0.97 Chantemerle 667 m Baye de Clarens (80 m) 1.50 Vers-Chez-Robert 680 m Tunnel de Cornaux (45 m) 1.99 Cornaux 705 m Chamby Museum 736 m Bifurcation from Lenk in the Simmental 2.95 Chamby ( wedge station ) 750 m to Montreux

The Blonay – Chamby railway is a 2.95-kilometer, meter-gauge , electrified and single-track railway line in the canton of Vaud in Switzerland , owned by Transports Montreux – Vevey – Riviera (MVR). In the summer season it is operated by the Blonay – Chamby (BC) museum railway as a historic railway .

history

The railway line from Blonay to Chamby went into operation on October 1, 1902 as part of the entire line Vevey - Saint-Légier - Blonay - Chamby. The building owner was the former Chemins de fer électriques Veveysans (CEV), which also carried out scheduled traffic until May 21, 1966.

After the passenger traffic was discontinued due to insufficient passenger numbers, the Association of Museum Railway Blonay – Chamby took over the operation and set up the first Swiss museum railway on July 20, 1968. The Blonay-Chamby has since official railway transport companies and has for this purpose a federal passenger transport concession . The infrastructure concession, however, remained with the CEV, and from 2001 with its legal successor Transports Montreux-Vevey-Riviera (MVR).

When the museum opened in 1968, an approximately 200-meter-long branch line was built between the Bifurcation service stop and the newly created depot , called Chamby-Musée, in Chaulin, which the association serves as a railway museum .

From 1998, operations on the Blonay – Chamby railway line were supplemented year-round as a supplement to the trains of the museum railway under the name Chemin de fer léger de la Riviera with continuous scheduled trains on the Vevey – Blonay – Chamby – Montreux railway line due to lack of demand, however, are given up again. Since then, the line has only been used by the seasonal museum trains and the MVR service trains .

business

The historic train operation takes place regularly every weekend between the beginning of May and the end of October. In addition to rail vehicles, tram cars are also used. In the official course book , the museum courses are listed in timetable field 115. The timetable field 115.1 serves as an addition, it contains the steam train between Chamby-Musée and Vevey on the last Sunday of each month.

When forming trains, it must be taken into account that the viaduct over the Baye de Clarens has a limited load-bearing capacity, which does not allow double traction . For this reason, trains that require two locomotives are usually provided at the head of the train and at the end of the train. This also serves to avoid shunting maneuvers at the end stations.

In addition to the historic trains, service trains run all year round for route maintenance. In addition, there are special trains and operational vehicle transfers for vehicle maintenance. The latter run between the network of the Montreux – Vevey – Riviera transport and that of the Montreux – Berner Oberland-Bahn , especially to their workshop in Chernex .

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  Historical destination indicator in Blonay

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  Viaduct over the Baye de Clarens

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  Cornaux stop

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  Level crossing between Cornaux and Bifurcation

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  Chamby train station

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  Chamby station (1975)

literature

• Sébastien Jarne (ed.): Le chemin de fer touristique Blonay – Chamby . Lausanne 1986.
• José Banaudo, Alex Rieben: à la decouverte du Chemin de fer-Musée Blonay – Chamby . Les Edition du Cabri, Breil-sur-Roya 1992, ISBN 2-903310-98-X .
• Alain Castella and Charles-Maurice Emery: Faire La Voie, Chemin de fer-Musée Blonay – Chamby . Department of Education, Youth and Culture (DFJC) - Office for Culture (SERAC) of the Canton of Vaud, Lausanne 2010.

Web links

Commons : Blonay – Chamby railway line  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Website of the museum railway
• Website of the railway company Transports Montreux – Vevey – Riviera (MVR)
• Chemins de fer électriques Veveysans (CEV). Blonay - Chamby MOB In: discontinued-bahnen.ch by Jürg Ehrbar

Individual evidence

1. ↑ The operating point is listed in the Swiss rail network from 1980
2. ↑ 40 years of Blonay – Chamby as the first Swiss museum railway! Bahnonline.ch, September 2, 2008, accessed October 15, 2018 . 
3. ↑ Timetable fields 115 and 115.1 2010 as PDF (accessed on July 9, 2010)