Dolomites Railway

The line was begun in 1916 to supply the military needs of the White War, when Italy attempted to annex the Austrian province of South Tyrol.

Both sides sought to construct railways to supply their troop operations among the peaks of the Dolomite range.

On the Italian side a steam-operated 750mm narrow gauge line was extended northwards from Calalzo towards Cortina,[2] while in the north the Austrians built a 700mm gauge feldbahn track southwards (with motive power from small petrol locomotives) from a military supply depot at Höhlenstein.

The Italian government then completed the line using money provided as reparation by the Austrian side, where possible using the route of the respective military railways.

[3] In February 2016 the regional governments of The Veneto and Trentino-Alto Adige announced that they were to commission a feasibility study to build a new line between Calalzo, Cortina and Toblach but in May 2021 regional president Luca Zaia announced that a line following the original route, while still under consideration, was not the most favoured solution.