The longest rail tunnel anywhere in the world has begun regular service in Switzerland.
It took 17 years to build the 35 mile stretch under the Swiss Alps, racked up costs of more than 12 billion Swiss francs (€11.2 billion) but provided the first flat route through the Alps.
An official ceremony opened the Gotthard Base tunnel in June, but it was on Sunday 11 December that passengers were first able to travel between Zurich and Lugano.
The first commercial traffic train left Zurich just after 6 am and reached Lugano at 8.17am. This cut the previous rail time by 30 minutes when passengers had to take the far more scenic route, opened in 1882, which winds through the mountains.
A primary goal in building the tunnel was to reduce travel time between Europe’s north and south for both passengers and cargo. The stretch from Zurich to Milan has been slashed by one hour.
Geography has dictated that the Gottard Pass, soaring to more than 2,000 metres, has for centuries been an important trade link between north and south. In recent times, traffic has continued to increase dramatically, reaching full capacity in 2013.
With the new service, freight can be shifted from lorries to trains in order to reduce the number of fatal road accidents as well as the damage to the environment caused by long haul shipments by truck.
The creation of the tunnel was possible due to technological advances in machinery able to bore through the rugged mountains instead of having to use explosives to blast through rock, a more expensive and also more dangerous technique.
The Gotthard Base tunnel has kicked into second place Japan’s 33-mile long Siekan tunnel which travels under the sea to connect the main island of Honshu with the northern island of Hokkaido.
The Channel tunnel, running at 31 miles between the UK and France, has been demoted to the world’s third longest.
