The railroad line is 96km, it has 107 tunnels, 900 sharp turns and around 850 bridges!!! It was first brought up by a journalist of a newspaper in Delhi in 1847, but it took 66 years, including the actual construction of eight years before it became a reality and opened to traffic in 1903. The line crosses rugged mountains and forests, crossing steep valleys and giving rail passengers with the most awesome views but at the same time the biggest whiplashes because of its sharpest curves of up to 48° angles! Nevertheless, the journey is worth the experience if you want to travel on the wild side.
The Kalka-Shimla Railroad is a narrow-gauge railway located in the Himachal Pradesh Province in northern India, located two hours by bird flight south of Kashmir. Connecting Kalka with the province’s capital, the railroad line has one of the highest density of bridges in the world, with one crossing every kilometer, predomonantly built of brick and including one of the world’s highest bridges, The Art Gallery Bridge (known as Bridge Nr. 226), a 91-foot tall bridge built in five layers of arches. Its height competes with the four brick viaducts in the Vogtland Region in Saxony.
The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway Society has put together a tour guide of the bridges and tunnels along the Kalka-Shimla Railway to provide you with an insight of the structures that exist in this mountainous region laden with forests and deep valleys. It looks at some of the best structures one can see while traveling the route or hiking in the region.
Click on the link below to access this guide and enjoy reading about the structures. 🙂
Link: https://artsandculture.google.com/story/FQWh_NO5CalCIQ
You can also watch the documentary on the history and tour of the railway, where you will see the bridges while on the journey of a lifetime.
It includes a short segment on the trains crossing Bridge Nr. 541:
Enjoy the journey and remember: Your bridge matters! 🙂 ❤
The Bridgehunter's Chronicles 