A cog railway is a special type of railway that differs from the usual one by the presence of a cog rail (rail). A toothed rail is usually laid in the middle between two conventional rails. Accordingly, the rolling stock of such railways is equipped with a gear .
Cog railway trains can travel much higher climbs than conventional railways. The steepest toothed railway in the world is the Pilatusbahn, leading to the top of the Pilate Mountain ( Switzerland , near Lucerne ). The slope of this road reaches 48%.
Types
There are several different types of toothed railways. The most common gear designs used on them are the Marsh, Abt, Locher, Riggenbach, Strub, and Von Roll systems.
Marsh System | Abt system | Locher system | Riggenbach System | Strub system |
Distribution
Toothed railways are in many countries. Most of them are in Switzerland (more than two dozen). One of the most famous and oldest roads (operating since 1884 ) of this type is the railway to Mount Corcovado in Rio de Janeiro . There are in Greece [1] . There are no classic toothed railways in Russia and the countries of the former Soviet Union , however, this principle - the use of a special gear-rail construction - is implemented in the elevator of the Krasnoyarsk Hydroelectric Power Station and in the drive of the cargo ports of the S-1 ship passage structure of the St. Petersburg flood protection complex . Previously, the third toothed rail was also used on the Nizhny Novgorod funiculars in 1896-1930.
Scope
Many toothed railways are mainly of tourist importance, since they deliver visitors (tourists, skiers, lovers of nature walks, etc.) to the peaks and slopes of the mountains. However, there are more utilitarian gear railways. For example, in Stuttgart, the route of one of the tram routes (route number 10) is designed as a cog railway [2] . Toothed railroads playing the role of urban public transport are also available in other cities, for example, Zurich [3] (Dolderbahn) and Budapest [4] .
To move ships along the Panama Canal , known as "mules" electric locomotives, "haulers", traveling along the cog railway.
See also
- Funicular
- Rack
Notes
- ↑ Railways of Greece
- ↑ Stuttgart - Zahnradbahn Archived September 27, 2007 on Wayback Machine
- ↑ Die VBZ haben einen neuen Webauftritt - Stadt Zürich Archived September 27, 2007 on the Wayback Machine
- ↑ Fogaskerekű Vasút Archived October 14, 2007 on Wayback Machine
Links
- Wikimedia Commons has media related to the Cog Railway
- Cog Railway in Germany
- Gear locomotives in the Panama Canal
- Montserrat. Rack railway. Photoreport