Rail transport in Lebanon

{{anchor|Damascus–Hama Railway|Beirut–Damascus Railway|Lebanese Tramway}}

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File:Pose du dernier rail a Damas le 25 juin 1895 (Beyrouth-Damas).jpeg

File:Viaduc de Khan-M'Rad (Beyrouth-Damas).jpeg, with a DHP train]]

File:Tunnel de Medarije (Beyrouth-Damas).jpeg]]

File:Station de Yahfoufah (Beyrouth-Damas).jpeg Station]]

File:Escarpements d'el Tekieh (Beyrouth-Damas).jpeg]]

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Beirut and Damascus were first connected by telegraph in 1861 and by a macadam road in 1863.{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA257 257]}} Syrian railways connecting the two cities ({{convert|90|mi|sp=us|abbr=on|disp=or}} over the crest of the Mount Lebanon range) or another port were planned as early as 1871 but were not enacted.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA104 104]}} In 1889, the Ammiyya Revolt broke out among the Druze and other Syrian farmers. The Ottoman response to the insurrection included a number of railway concessions—quickly sold to foreign interests—to improve the development and centralized control of the region.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA104 104]}}

File:CUINET(1896) LA SYRIE.jpg and Beirut, depicting the original Beirut–Damascus–Hauran Railway and planned route of the DHP]]

Hasan Beyhum Efendi received a concession to construct a tramway between Beirut and Damascus in 1891.{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} Beyhum sold the concession later that year to the French {{nowrap|Beirut–Damascus Tramway}} ({{langx|fr|Compagnie de la voie ferrée économique de Beyrouth–Damas}}){{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}}{{sfnp|Anderson & al.|1918|p=[https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog#page/n212/mode/2up 208]}} or {{nowrap|Lebanon Railway}}, which was anxious to forestall two mooted British lines, one from Jaffa{{citation |title=Section Libanaise de l'Association Française des Amis des Chemins de fer [Lebanese Section of the French Railway Friends Association] |url=http://www.afacliban.org |archive-url=https://archive.today/20160510154910/http://www.afacliban.org/ |url-status=usurped |archive-date=10 May 2016 |contribution=Un bref aperçu de l’histoire des chemins de fer au Liban [A Brief History of Railways in Lebanon] |contribution-url=http://www.afacliban.org/AFAC-LIBAN/Histoire.html |accessdate=24 August 2008 }}. {{in lang|fr}} and another from Haifa,{{sfnp|Anderson & al.|1918|p=[https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog#page/n212/mode/2up 208]}}{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA257 257]}}{{refn|group=n|Yusuf Ilyas Efendi and Robert Philling's Syria Ottoman Railway Company, which lost its 1890 concession a year later after having failed to construct any track and ultimately was nationalized by the Ottomans in 1900 along with the British Haifa–Darʾa Railway after both ran into financial difficulties after only completing {{convert|8|km|sp=us|abbr=on}} of track each.{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA196 196]}}}} either of which would have undercut Beirut's status as the primary port of the northern Levant.{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA257 257]}} In the event, the Jaffa line was never extended towards Damascus and the Haifa line ran out of money having completed just {{convert|8|km|sp=us|abbr=on}}{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA196 196]}} or {{convert|21|mi|sp=us|abbr=on}}{{sfnp|Anderson & al.|1918|p=[https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog#page/n212/mode/2up 208]}} of track.

Around the same time, the French {{nowrap|Damascus Tramways}} ({{lang|fr|Compagnie des tramways de Damas et voies ferrées économiques de Syrie}}){{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} or Belgian {{nowrap|Syrian Railway}} ({{lang|fr|Chemin de fer en Syrie}}){{citation |last=Ludvigsen |first=Børre |date=2008 |contribution=CEL: Chemin de Fer de l'Etate Libanais: The Lebanese State Railway Company |contribution-url=http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/380/385/railways/ |title=Al Mashriq: The Levant |url=http://almashriq.hiof.no |location=Halden |publisher=Østfold University |accessdate=16 September 2015 }}.{{citation |last=Knowles |first=J.W. |contribution=The Beirut Damascus Railway |title=Continental Railway Journal |volume=18 |date=June 1974 |pages=117–123 }}. purchased another native's concession for the {{convert|65|mi|sp=us|abbr=on}} {{nowrap|Damascus–Muzeirib Railway}}.{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} The Hauran around Muzeirib is Syria's breadbasket and the town also served as the point of departure for pilgrim caravans during the Hajj.

The two lines quickly merged as the {{lang|fr|Société des Chemins de fer Ottomans économiques de Beyrouth–Damas–Hauran}} or {{lang|fr|Société des chemins de fer ottomans economiques de Beyrouth–Havran}},{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} with its headquarters in Constantinople (Istanbul) and an office in Paris.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 97]}} It originally planned to use a meter gauge but ended with a {{RailGauge|1050mm}} gauge, along with expensive Abt rack sections to deal with the Mount Lebanon range. It ran through the Dar al-Beida Pass,{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA257 257]}} with the summit at Beidar ({{convert|37|km|sp=us|abbr=on|disp=or}} from Beirut) {{convert|1487|m|sp=us|abbr=on|disp=or}} above sea level. The railway completed its port at Beirut in December 1892.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 97]}}

In 1893, the company received a concession for a line from Damascus to Birecik in Anatolia,{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} which prompted its name to be changed to the {{nowrap|Damascus–Hama Railway}} or {{nowrap|Damascus–Hama and Extensions}} ({{lang|fr|Société Ottomane du Chemins de fer de Damas-Hamah et Prolongements}}, DHP; {{langx|tr|Şam–Hama ve Temdidi Osmanlı Demiryolu Şirketi}}).{{citation |last=Ludvigsen |first=Børre |date=2008 |contribution=Background |contribution-url=http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/380/385/railways/background/index.html |title=Al Mashriq: The Levant |url=http://almashriq.hiof.no |location=Halden |publisher=Østfold University |accessdate=16 September 2015 }}. The network is also known as the {{nowrap|Syrian Railways}} in English.{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA195 195]}} The initial concession was later emended to link the two lines at Riyaq instead of Damascus. Service from Damascus south to Muzeirib began in July 1894 (in time for that year's harvest){{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 97]}} and to Beirut on 3 August 1895. The trip from the coast to Damascus initially took 9 hours and terminated at three different stations: Baramke Station, Qanawat Station, and Midan Station.{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA257 257]}} Between 1900 and 1908, the separate Hejaz Railway (HRR){{refn|group=n|The Hejaz Railway was also an Ottoman response to a local uprising: in its case, the Hauran Uprising of 1898.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA104 104]}}}} expanded from Damascus south to Medina, with a branch to Haifa opened in 1906.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 97]}} The HRR was built to a 1.05-meter gauge to match the Beirut–Damascus Railway{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA258 258]}} and absorbed both the former British concession and the DHP's line south from Damascus.){{sfnp|Anderson & al.|1918|p=[https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog#page/n212/mode/2up 208]}}

Wheat from the Hauran—high-protein semolina used in pasta{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA100 100]}}—was intended to be the mainstay of the railway's income, along with the Muslim pilgrimage trade during the Hajj.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 97]}} The entry of American, Indian, and Australian wheat into the European market amid the continuing Long Depression, however, undercut that trade while the railway was still under construction.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA100 100]}} Damascene traders had thought the Beirut railway would allow them to export their grain more cheaply; instead, as early as the 1894 harvest, the rail flooded the market, collapsing prices and margins.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA105 105]}} Completion of the line to the coast did not improve matters, since the world market was trading at still lower prices{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA105 105]}} and the premium once commanded by Hauran wheat—which, being hand-harvested, might include pebbles or weeds—was now lost to machine-reaped grain from the United States.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA100 100]}} It was not until 1908 that export values again reached the levels of the 1880s.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA100 100]}} The railway itself was one of the best-managed in the Ottoman Empire: It had total receipts of $434,000 for 1900 and in 1906 received a guarantee from the government of $4320 per mile on the 200-mile Aleppo Railway{{citation |last=Freeman |first=Lewis R. |author-link=Lewis R. Freeman |contribution=The Railway Lines of Syria and Palestine: Resumé of Conditions before the War; Well Managed Lines of Syria Compared with Run-down Hedjaz Railway |date=1915 |publisher=Simmons–Boardman Publishing Co. |title=Railway Age Gazette |volume=59 |pages=199ff}} All the same, the company was never very profitable: it was at perpetual risk of bankruptcy; shares traded at 550 Fr in 1891 and only 468 Fr in 1909; and dividends were minuscule: 4.40 Fr in 1902 and 6.31 Fr in 1909.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA105 105]}}

File:W. & A.K. Johnston. Asia Minor. 1911.jpg depicting the DHP's northward extension to Aleppo and the HRR's parallel track through the Hauran]]

The line suffered a serious accident at Aley on 12 April 1904. Aley had grown with the railroad and functioned as a summer resort for the people of Beirut. Part of the locomotive exploded on the 7% incline east of town and, not thinking to apply the brakes, the train was allowed to fly back through the station. Two cars were completely destroyed upon the rocks on the other side, killing 8 and seriously injuring 21.{{citation |contribution=Unfall auf der Hauranbahn [Accident on the Hauran Road] |contribution-url=http://anno.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/anno-plus?apm=0&aid=lok&datum=19040005&zoom=2&seite=00000049&x=15&y=8 |title=Die Lokomotive: Illustrierte Fachzeitung |url=http://anno.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/anno-plus?aid=lok&datum=1904&size=45&page=1 |date=May 1904 |location=Vienna |publisher=Kaiserlich-Königliche Hofbibliothek |page=49 }}. {{in lang|de}}

The Aleppo Railway via the Beqaa Valley between the Mount Lebanon range and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains was built to standard gauge. As a result, traffic between the two lines had to be transferred at Riyaq.{{citation |last=Ludvigsen |first=Børre |date=2008 |contribution=Riyaq–Homs |contribution-url=http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/380/385/railways/branches/riyaq-homs/index.html |title=Al Mashriq: The Levant |url=http://almashriq.hiof.no |location=Halden |publisher=Østfold University |accessdate=16 September 2015 }}. The line opened as far as Baalbek on 19 June 1902 and began service to Aleppo on 4 October 1906.{{citation |title=Reports and Papers |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sO1GAQAAMAAJ |volume=CXVI |page=810 |location=London |publisher=House of Commons |date=1908 }}. The Baghdad Railway reached Aleppo in 1912, connecting the line with Istanbul.

The concession for the Tripoli–Saida line was purchased from its original holder, a Syrian, by the French {{lang|fr|Société ottomane des libanais nord et sud de Beyrouth}}.{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA196 196]}} By 1898, it had only laid {{convert|19|km|sp=us|abbr=on}} of track{{sfnp|Bilmez|2008|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA196 196]}} and the DHP's concession was emended to permit a branch line to Tripoli. This was eventually extended northward to reconnect with the Aleppo Railway at Homs, beginning service in 1911. During the First World War, however, its track was removed for use elsewhere.

A separate {{RailGauge|1050mm}}-gauge coastal railway, the {{nowrap|Lebanese Tramway}} ({{lang|fr|Tramway Libanais}}) began service in 1895 and reached Maameltein in 1908.

During the First World War, the Ottoman Empire seized control of all foreign-owned railways in the country, including the DHP.{{sfnp|Burns|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA259 259]}} The entire Hauran line was disassembled to extend the Palestine Railways toward the Suez Canal.{{citation needed|date=September 2015}}

File:Taurus Express route map.svg's Taurus Express network {{circa|lk=no|1930}}.]]

Following the First World War, France held the mandate for Syria and Lebanon under the auspices of the League of Nations. The DHP's ownership of its track was reinstated and it was also given control of the Hejaz Railway.{{citation needed|date=September 2015}} Competition between the French port at Beirut and the British one at Haifa led to tariff wars and, in 1921, land swaps in Palestine for Syrian railway rights.{{sfnp|Schilcher|1998|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA98 98]}}

From around 1930, the Aleppo Railway formed a stage on the Taurus Express's southern route to Cairo. An alternate route ran along the Tripoli line to Beirut. The service was operated by the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits and was discontinued in 1972.{{citation needed|date=September 2015}} In 1933, the Syrian Lines to Baghdad ({{lang|fr|Lignes Syriennes de Baghdad}}) arranged the Baghdad Railway as a subsidiary of the DHP.{{citation needed|date=September 2015}}

File:Australian Army Engineers, African Auxillary Pioneer Corps and Lebanese workers in the cutting at Maameltein Lebanon, 1942.jpg The railways saw significant use in the Second World War. The British originally planned to connect their standard-gauge network from Haifa to Riyaq but gave up the project in 1941 as too difficult. Instead, engineers from South Africa and Australia completed a standard-gauge line along the coast between Haifa and Beirut by 24 August 1942 and expanded this to Tripoli Railway Station by 18 December 1942.Australian Railway Construction in the Middle East Knowles, J.W. Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin, November, 1978 pp. 244–259 This {{nowrap|Haifa–Beirut–Tripoli Railway}} (HBT) was the last link connecting the European and North African standard-gauge rail networks, apart from the ferry across the Bosphorus at Istanbul, but it never operated for civilian use. Instead, the British maintained it under the control of their military as late as February 1948, when the Jewish insurgency in Palestine destroyed the bridges near the tunnels at Ras al-Nakura. An earlier attempt by Haganah forces to attack the HBT in two places near Nahal Kziv during the Night of the Bridges in 1946 was unsuccessful. Nowadays the only portion of the HBT still in operation is the Coastal Railway between Nahariya and Haifa in northern Israel.

File:USMC-Lebanon82-84.jpg Marines patrol a CEL railway as part of the Multinational Force in Lebanon in August 1983]]

File:Bhamdoun Bahnhof.jpg (2012)]]

General Georges Catroux proclaimed the independence of Lebanon in 1941 but the French did not actually permit local rule until 1943. In 1946, the Lebanese government bought the Naqoura–Tripoli Railway for {{nowrap|£5 000 000}}, yielding its management to DHP. Syria nationalized its own railways in 1956 as CFS (Chemins de Fer Syriens). In 1960 or 1961, the country's network was reorganized as the Lebanese Railway ({{lang|fr|Chemin de fer de l'État Libanais}}, CEL). The Lebanese Civil War caused considerable damage to the rail network, however, and services gradually ceased. During the civil war, damage was caused by militias who blew up the tracks, Israeli army shelling and Syrian security forces digging up parts of the track to sell as scrap metal in Pakistan. A 1974 article revealed that the 1.05-m DHP system was still working but still using steam power, uncompetitive and loss making. The line between Beirut and Damascus was closed in 1976. Commuter service between Dora and Byblos ceased in 1993 and the last regular rail operations in Lebanon—trains carrying cement from Chekka to Beirut—ended in 1997. The Polish diesel locomotive class SP45 for this line continued to be run once a month at the Furn el Shebbak stockyards as late as 2002, but service was not resumed.

Only a very short length of the Syrian Homs-Tartus line crosses the border into Lebanon. This happens because the railway was built before this border was defined. While today in Syria, all {{RailGauge|sg}} network and trains are operated by CFS (Chemins de Fer Syriens).

Agatha Christie wrote the first part of her novel Murder on the Orient Express during her stay in room 203 in Baron Hotel in Aleppo.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/02/24/world/aleppo-journal-a-small-hotel-its-memories-fading.html|title=Aleppo Journal; A Small Hotel, Its Memories Fading|last=Times|first=Alan Cowell, Special to the New York|date=24 February 1990|work=The New York Times|access-date=2017-05-20|issn=0362-4331}}

The novel doesn't start in Istanbul, or on the Orient Express. It opens on the platform at Aleppo, next to the two blue-and-gold Wagons-Lits sleeping cars of the Taurus Express bound for Istanbul. The Taurus Express was inaugurated in February 1930 by the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, the same company that operated the Orient Express and Simplon Orient Express, as a means of extending their services beyond Istanbul to the East. It ran several times a week from Istanbul Haydarpaşa station to Aleppo and Baghdad, with a weekly through sleeper to Tripoli in Lebanon. After World War II, the Wagons-Lits company gradually withdrew and operation of the Taurus Express was taken over by the Turkish, Syrian and Iraqi state railways. Up until the late 1980s, a twice-weekly Istanbul-Baghdad service was maintained, with weekly through seating cars from Istanbul to Aleppo. For political reasons, the through service to Baghdad was suspended and the main train curtailed at Gaziantep, but the weekly through seat cars Istanbul-Aleppo were maintained. In 2001, the Aleppo portion of the Toros Express was upgraded to a Syrian sleeping-car replacing the two basic Turkish seat cars.{{Cite web|url=https://www.seat61.com/Syria.htm#London%20to%20Aleppo|title = How to travel by train from London to Syria | Train travel in Syria}}

Trains functioning in Syria:

• LDE DE (Diesel-electric)
• DMU-5 DH (Diesel-hydraulic): Multiple units from Hyundai Rotem, Korea for Aleppo-Damascus/Latakia long-distance services. 222-second class, 61 first class.

Networks:

• Damascus - Homs - Hamah - Aleppo - Maydan Ikbis (- Ankara, Istanbul, Turkey TCDD)
• Aleppo (- Gaziantep, Turkey TCDD)
• Aleppo - Latakia - Tartus - Al Akkari - Homs
• Homs - Palmyra: freight only, opened for phosphates traffic, destined for the port of Tartus, in 1980
• Line runs from the oilfields of Al Qamishli in the north to the port of Latakia (750 km)
• Al Akkari (- Tripoli CEL, out of use)
• Aleppo - Deir ez-Zor - Al-Qamishli (- Nusaybin, Turkey TCDD)
• Extension from Homs southwards to Damascus (194 km) was opened in 1983
• {{convert|80|km|abbr=on}} Tartus-Latakia line in 1992
• Al Qamishli - Al-Yaarubiyah (- IRR Iraq, out of use)
• Damascus - Sheikh Miskin - Dera'a: under construction, to replace a section of Hejaz railway
• Sheikh Miskin - Suwayda (under construction)
• Palmyra - Deir ez-Zor - Abu Kemal (- IRR Iraq) (planned)

Israel's national railway operator, Israel Railways, has planned a rail link from Lebanon to its own network, branching off the Haifa-Karmiel railway in Ahihud.{{Cite web|url=https://www.rail.co.il/tenders/Documents/TendersDcouments/Dima%202020/%D7%9E%D7%A1%D7%9E%D7%9B%D7%99%20%D7%9E%D7%9B%D7%A8%D7%96/%D7%9E%D7%9B%D7%A8%D7%96%2021943/%D7%A0%D7%A1%D7%A4%D7%97%20%D7%A9%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%AA%D7%99%D7%9D%2023.08.2020.pdf#page-17|title = Error}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.rail.co.il/tenders/Documents/TendersDcouments/2016/11605/%D7%A0%D7%A1%D7%A4%D7%97%20A7%20%D7%94%D7%A0%D7%97%D7%99%D7%95%D7%AA%20%D7%9C%D7%A2%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9B%D7%94%20%D7%95%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%9F%20%D7%A9%D7%A8%D7%98%D7%95%D7%98%D7%99%D7%9D%2017-01-2016.pdf#page-108|title=Error}} These plans are unlikely to materialize given the absence of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

Trains functioning in Israel:

• Siemens Desiro HC (Electric)
• Siemens Viaggio Light (Diesel-electric)
• Bombardier Double-Deck Coach (Electric and Diesel-electric)

Networks:

• Beersheba - Kiryat Gat - Ramla - Lod - Tel Aviv - Herzliya - Haifa - Nahariya
• Beersheba - Kiryat Gat - Ramla - Lod - Tel Aviv - Herzliya - Hadera - Haifa - Karmiel
• Modi'in - Ben Gurion Airport - Tel Aviv - Binyamina - Haifa - Nahariya
• Jerusalem - Ben Gurion Airport - Tel Aviv - Herzliya
• Atlit - Haifa - Afula - Beit She'an
• Beersheba - Netivot - Ashkelon - Lod - Tel Aviv - Herzliya - Netanya - Hadera - Binyamina
• Ashkelon - Rishon LeZiyyon - Tel Aviv - Rosh Ha'Ayin - Kfar Saba - Herzliya
• Beit Shemesh - Ramla - Lod - Tel Aviv - Herzliya - Netanya
• Beersheba - Dimona
• Beersheba - Ramat Hovev (freight only)
• Beersheba - Dimona - Rotem (freight only)
• Hadera - Kfar Saba - Rosh Ha'Ayin - Lod (under construction)
• Rishon LeZiyyon - Modi'in (under construction)

File:La gare de Beyrouth.JPG in 2007]]

File:La voie emportée par la mer à Saïda.JPG in 2007]]

File:Locomotive à Tripoli (Liban).jpg in 2007]]

File:Baalbek,railway station1.jpg Railway Station in 2009]]

There have been a number of proposals for reviving the Lebanese railway system, but as yet, none have come to fruition.Section Libanaise de l’Association Française des Amis des Chemins de fer. {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20110724225251/http://www.afacliban.org/AFAC-LIBAN/Actualit%C3%A9.html Actualité]}}. Retrieved 24 August 2008.Lebanese railway revival to be studied [http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/news/middle-east/single-view/view/lebanese-railway-revival-to-be-studied.html]. Retrieved 23 August 2013. One such planned revival is being led by Elias Maalouf, founder of the Lebanese NGO, Train Train. Maalouf is planning to relaunch the line between the coastal cities of Byblos and Batroun, to show the feasibility of having trains running again. The project, with a budget of £430,000, should take only a matter of months to complete, but as of 2014, Maalouf was still waiting for the green light from the Lebanese government.{{cite news|last1=Van Tets|first1=Fernande|title=All aboard the Lebanon express: Nostalgia and a desperate need could revive Arab world's first railway|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/all-aboard-the-lebanon-express-nostalgia-and-an-urgent-need-could-revive-arab-worlds-first-railway-9804817.html|accessdate=6 April 2015|work=The Independent|date=19 October 2014}}

According to a study funded by the European Investment Bank, a railway line connecting Beirut to Tripoli would cost $3 billion to build, while a freight railway from Tripoli to Homs would cost much less. However, efforts to revive Lebanon's railway system have been stymied by the Syrian Civil War.

In 2011, Dr. Maroun Kassab, an architect and assistant professor, proposed a coastal metro system that can capitalize on the existing lands owned by the ministry and that can run underground from Tyr to Tripoli.{{cite news|last1=Kassab|first1=Maroun|title=PROPOSAL FOR A LEBANESE COASTAL METRO SYSTEM|url=https://marounkassab.com/proposal-for-a-lebanese-coastal-metro/}}

In February 2022 media reported a proposed Spanish grant for the reestablishment of Lebanese railways.{{Cite web |title=Lebanon to get Spanish funds for railway revival plan: minister - Al-Monitor: The Pulse of the Middle East |url=https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/02/lebanon-get-spanish-funds-railway-revival-plan-minister |access-date=2022-03-19 |website=www.al-monitor.com |date=24 February 2022 |language=en}}

• Beirut Tramway
• Syrian railways
• Transport in Syria
• Arab Mashreq International Railway
• Palestine Railways
• Tripoli Railway Station
• OCFTC, Lebanon's public transport operator
• AS DPHB, the defunct football club of the Lebanese railways

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{{reflist|30em}}

• {{citation |last=Anderson |first=Frank Maloy |author2-last=Hershey |author2-first=Amos Shartle |display-authors=1 |ref={{harvid|Anderson & al.|1918}} |contribution=Railway Concessions in Turkey |contribution-url=https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog#page/n208/mode/2up |title=Handbook for the Diplomatic History of Europe, Asia, and Africa 1870–1914 |url=https://archive.org/stream/handbookfordipl01hersgoog |date=1918 |location=Washington |publisher=GPO for the National Board for Historical Service |pages=205–211 }}.
• {{citation |last=Bilmez |first=Bülent |contribution=European Investments in the Ottoman Railways, 1850–1914 |contribution-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC&pg=PA183 |pages=183–206 |editor-last=Roth |editor-first=Ralf |editor2-last=Dinhobl |editor2-first=Günter |display-editors=0 |title=Across the Borders: Financing the World's Railways in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1It_7wEJbeIC |date=2008 |location=Aldershot |publisher=MPG Books for Ashgate Publishing |isbn=978-0-7546-6029-3 }}.
• {{citation |last=Burns |first=Ross |title=Damascus: A History |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cYqCAgAAQBAJ |date=2005 |publisher=Routledge |location=Abingdon |isbn=978-0-415-41317-6 }}.
• {{citation |last=Schilcher |first=Linda S. |contribution=Railways in the Political Economy of Southern Syria 1890–1925 |title=The Syrian Land: Processes of Integration and Fragmentation: Bilād al-Shām from the 18th to the 20th Century |editor-last=Philipp |editor-first=Thomas |editor2-last=Schaebler |editor2-first=Birgit |display-editors=0 |series=Berliner Islamstudien [Islamic Studies in Berlin], Vol. 6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC |contribution-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=B-iDgNPVuhAC&pg=PA97 |pages=97–112 |location=Stuttgart |publisher=Franz Steiner Verlag |isbn=3-515-07309-4 |date=1998 }}.

{{commons category|Rail transport in Lebanon}}

• [http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/380/385/railways/maps/index.html Maps of Lebanon's lines, stations, and stockyards] at Al Mashriq
• [https://www.un.org/Depts/Cartographic/map/profile/lebanon.pdf UN Map]
• [https://www.un.org/Depts/Cartographic/map/profile/syria.pdf UN Map Syria]
• [https://marounkassab.com/proposal-for-a-lebanese-coastal-metro/ Dr. Maroun Kassab's Proposal]

{{Asia in topic|Rail transport in}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rail Transport in Lebanon}}

Category:Rail transport in Syria

Category:Ottoman railways