Railways and the Gotthard

Switzerland is a railway country. It is said of its railway network that it is the densest in the world. That means: there are very many railway lines on a small area. Almost every village can be reached by train or bus. People in Switzerland travel more kilometres by train per year than in almost any other country.

The largest railway company is SBB. That stands for «Schweizerische Bundesbahnen» (Swiss Federal Railways). It belongs to the Confederation. There are also many smaller railway companies, for example BLS (Bern-Lötschberg-Simplon), SOB (Schweizerische Südostbahn) and SZU (Sihltal-Zürich-Uetliberg-Bahn). They all work together, and you can travel through the whole country with one ticket.

At 57 kilometres, the Gotthard Base Tunnel is the longest railway tunnel in the world. It runs from Erstfeld (canton of Uri) to Bodio (canton of Ticino) and was opened in 2016. The tunnel lies deep down in the mountain and is almost flat. This way freight and passenger trains get through the Alps faster and more easily.

Memory aid: Gotthard: 57 km, opened in 2016. A world record.