Ferrocarril de Langreo

When the railroad Ferrocarril de Langreo is a narrow-gauge railway in the autonomous Spanish region of Asturias, which connects the city of Gijón with the community Laviana, merging of the districts Siero and Langreo. The name of the railway line refers to the municipality of Langreo, since originally the terminus of the line has been in this community. However, the railway line was extended in the 19th century to the present endpoint in Laviana.

History

The railway line was opened in 1846 to provide a railway link between the port of Gijón and the community Langreo. Langreo is located in a mining region and a new railroad track should make it possible in particular to transport raw materials to the coast in order to load them there on ships and export by sea. Originally the railway traffic was served by a railway company founded specifically which also called Ferrocarril de Langreo. The tracks then had a track width of 1432mm, so the tracks had approximately the width of a standard gauge railway. Here, however, no rolling stock could be used that was designed for tracks in the international standard gauge.

In the 1960s it came to Asturias as well as in many other European mining regions in a crisis, so that the mining sector has to date always lost in economic importance. As a result, the railway line was needed to a lesser extent for commodity transport. The increasingly run-down railway line was also taken over in 1972 by the state-owned railway company feve how many narrow gauge railways in all regions of Spain that were previously mostly operated by private rail companies. Between the years 1983 and 1984 the route was converted to a track width of 1000mm and made ​​possible by a direct connection to the other operated by the feve railway lines in northern Spain.

Operation

The track plays today, especially in passenger traffic and a role is integrated as a line F5 in the S-Bahn system in the region of Asturias, which operates with modern railcars between the main station of the city of Gijón and Laviana.

Goods traffic on the route to a lesser extent place as before, with the primary no longer raw materials to the port of Gijón be transported but goods of various kinds between various industries with siding.

Route

The route begins at the port of El Musel in the Spanish city of Gijón, which has not yet occurred passenger on the first kilometers of the route. In the city center, a bag station is double track meter gauge and broad gauge in Iberian, on which all railway lines start in passenger transport. Thus also the traits of the S -Bahn line F5 initiated on this railway line by a branch line. Are located on the railway line initially still some breakpoints in the urban area. Following the trail leads into the composite community Siero, the more breakpoints are also served. In El Berron district the railway line crosses the Asturian Basque- railway, which runs from Bilbao to Oviedo at the same level, but allow connecting curves a transition between the two distances. The path continues through the districts Norena, Langreo, San Martín del Rey Aurelio and Laviana, where she served various breakpoints. In Langreo opens a coming from Oviedo broad-gauge railway, the railway line, which runs parallel to the El Entrego station next to the narrow gauge line. Inter alia wrong on this which is operated by RENFE suburban train line C-2.