Fervia Catania-Caltagion-gela – Wikipedia

The Lentini branch-Gela It is a single -track railway line that, transversely, connects the Ionian side and the Mediterranean side of Sicily crossing some large urban centers. From 8 May 2011 the line has been interrupted, in the Caltagirone-Gela section, at km 326+600 for the collapse of a viaduct.

Premise [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

The construction of the railway lines in Sicily began a few years after the proclamation of the Unification of Italy as it had already been found that the transport by iron promoted the development of the territory; Both the Chamber of Commerce of Catania and the entrepreneurs and the large agricultural producers therefore pressed on the authorities in charge so that a series of railway lines connecting the interior of the island and the port of Catania was created.
On 1 July 1869 he had been inaugurated, with the completion of the long viaduct of the Marina and of Gallery of the Squicella , treats it from Catania Centrale to Catania Acquicella and from this to Bicocca and to the Lentini station. The railway connection had also been opened up to Catania Marittima within the port of Catania.
On January 19, 1871 the line was also ready by Lentini at the Syracuse station.

From Caltagirone to Catania [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

Starting from 1872, the entrepreneurs of the rich agricultural area of ​​the Calatino advanced the request for construction of a ferrata road that connected the city of Caltagirone with Catania by grafting near the Lake Lentini on the Ionian coastal railway towards Catania already in operation since 1869. The The need of the railway trunk was connected to the prospect of opening new markets to agricultural and food products of the Calatino area also making use of the maritime trade in the port of Catania.

The Caltagirone-Valsavoja was inserted between the lines of 3 category to be built, according to the directives of the Law 29 July 1879, n. 5002 ; This provided for this category the contribution of the local authorities concerned for the construction. The municipalities concerned therefore settled in the consortium in order to submit the request for concession to the government; In Caltagirone on 6 August 1877 a project was developed and approved that provided for an allocation of local authorities, for a total of 2,000,000 lire of the time, as follows percentage: Province of Catania 15%, municipality of Catania 12%, Caltagirone 37 %, Grammichele 7%, Vizzini 12%, Militello 9%, Scordia 5%, Licodia Eubea 3%.

The government approved the allocation of the funds necessary in October 1881 but with the contribution of a tenth of the expenses paid by the Consortium. In June 1888 an agreement was stipulated … between S. E. the Minister of Public Works, Commendatore Giuseppe Saracco and S.E. The Minister of Finance and Minister for Interim of the Treasury, Commendatore Agostino Magliani, contracting in the name of the State, and the Commendatore Adolfo Billia, general manager of the Italian Society for the Ferrate roads of Sicily, contracting in the name of the company itself In order to build a passing railway For Contrada Fildidonna, Militello, Contrada Nocifero and Grammichele up to Caltagirone. The concession obtained by the company on the ferrata roads of Sicily allowed the start of the works; The first taken from Valsavoia to Scordia was opened in late November 1889, the entire line was inaugurated on October 31, 1892.

The route, closed since 2017 due to an accident, was reactivated February 18, 2019 ^[2] .

From Caltagirone the Gail [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

The route from Caltagirone to Gela (the latter then called Terranova), 45.566 km long, also in relation to the lower number of centers crossed that minimized the possibility of contribution, was approved only in 1911 and inserted between the railways of 4 category and therefore authorized with reduced gauge together with other secondary railways. The connection would have reduced the total route from Catania to about 135 km, much shorter than the via Canicattì itineraries of 231 km and via Siracusa and Ragusa of 268 km but penalized by the “load breaking” in Caltagirone.
However, the outbreak of the First World War blocked everything. In 1921 a bill was presented for the normal gauge conversion of the construction project ^[3] . On November 24, 1921 the Royal Decree no. 1696 had its excerpt from the reduced gauge construction plan and the RD n. 1796, issued on the same date, prescribed its building to ordinary and borne by the State ^[4] . But the works launched, only some work of art was created and the outbreak of the Second World War blocked them completely.
In the early 1950s, a study was prepared to resume work by updating the project once again with the following characteristics: curves with a minimum radius of 500 m, maximum slope of 18 per thousand and speed of 95 km/h. The works began in April 1952 but were carried out with extreme slowness and the opening to traffic took place in November 1979.

The inaugural journey was made by two locomotives D.345, the 345.1122 and the 345,1132 arrived in temporary subsidy, which some time later were reported, leaving the service charges on the line to the oldest D.343 of the Locomotive Deposit of Catania .

The activated connection opened a direct itinerary between the agricultural and industrial centers of Gela, Licata, Vittoria, Modica, Ragusa, Niscemi and Caltagirone with the commercial areas of consumption and in the direction of Messina and the continent. The delay in construction, however, already had consequences on the future of the line; To it was added the crisis of the State Railways whose development and modernization programs were questioned by the various political guidelines. And also the commodity transport of the director had poured on the trucks and roads. The line, however, already had a consistent movement of commute travelers from the inauguration given the presence of the petrochemical pole of Gela and goods including predominant were the refined products of oil towards foreign and national markets. However, the failure to electrify, which obliged to double and triple tractions of freight trains with the little powerful locomotive 343 (with exorbitant personnel costs) and the use, for travelers, of Aln 668,1500 and 1600 uphill lens and subject to frequent Fairy (especially in summer) slowly distracted commuters from the line.

On 8 May 2011 the line was interrupted, in the Caltagirone-Gela section, from the collapse to 326 km+600 of the ninth and tenth arcata and a pylon of the viaduct of Coal plan . At the time of the collapse there were no convoys in transit ^[5] . The connections between the two centers have since been replaced by Trenitalia’s autoservices. The collapse of the viaduct also led to the closure to the transit of the underlying SP 39 Niscemi-Caltagirone ^[6] . The viaduct was subsequently demolished on 7 October 2014 ^[7] .

Reopening project [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

A project for the reconstruction of the collapsed viaduct and for the reopening of the railway section, also comprising the modernization of the other 11 viaducts present and other minor works, was presented in August 2018. It is expected to reopen the Caltagirone-Gela section in the 2022. ^[8]

The railway has the first stretch, from Catania Centrale station to the Lentini branch station, whose name until the end of the seventies was Valsavoia station , common to the Messina-Syracuse railway and is electrified of continuous current at 3000 volts. In the station of Valsavoia The first track is that of origin of the simple binary line that branches off ^[15] Folding immediately to the right and skirting Lake Lentini with a series of curves and a long straight in moderate rise to the entrance ramp of the Scordia station, an important citrus center of the province of Catania. In this first section the maximum speed is 90 km/h for the “B” rank ^[16] .
From Scordia the line proceeds in an almost constant rise of 28 per thousand, with hairpin bends and screws, attacking the ramp that will bring it to the plateau of up to Militello in Val di Catania and to the isolated station of Mineo where it reaches the culmination and begins the steep Descent to the Vizzini-Langodia station ^[17] . Once this was accompanied by this, the departure station of the Syracuse-Ragusa-Vizzini railway was until 1954 which allowed to reach the Hyblean and Pantalica capital. The railway continues between steep descents and climbed up to 27 per thousand up to Grammichele from where it starts downhill and then attack with another steep section of the 30 per thousand the climb to the Caltagirone station ^[18] All this route allows a maximum speed of 70/75 km/h. Until 1979 the station was, at a higher share, on the north ridge of the hill on which the city stands and the Dittaino-Piazza Armerina-Caltagirone railway (with a reduced gauge) branched off from it.
Following the opening of the trafficking of the trafficking up to Gela, a new and larger station was built on the south side and at less high altitude. The second part of the line is built with more modern criteria, it has larger curves that allow the maximum speed of 100 km/h for the “B” rank ^[16] With a maximum ascent of 18 per thousand in straight and 16 per thousand in the corner (in the direction of travel from Gela to Caltagirone) ^[19] . Immediately after the Caltagirone station, the tracks enter and leave the 26 galleries along 11.8 km in them and passing on numerous viaducts and bridges of which some of considerable size, overall for 7.8 km, with some of them in the curve.
The stations crossed, except for the Niscemi station, are not needed any inhabited center and are only for the purpose of service for crossing or precedence; Nonetheless, they were built with underpass and shelters. Having been in the beginning they are in the total state of abandonment. The line is almost all downhill until Plain of the Lord and ends in a straight in the large Gela station by getting conflicting in the coastal line for Caltanissetta and Siracusa ^[20] .

Telegraphic block [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

The stations were equipped from the beginning of the telegraph equipment that allowed the forwarding of the trains with the safety of the green light between the station and the station. The circuits and phones type Western to wooden cassette with cigeo current generator were later installed and established the circulation regime with a telephone block.

Single Manager [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

Around the 1930s in order to reduce the operating expenses, the FS introduced in the complementary and secondary lines of the Italian railway network the single management system by eliminating the station garments from the intermediate stations and leaving them only in those of branches and Capotronco. The Valsavoia-Caltagirone section was also transformed into a single management based in Caltagirone from where the railway traffic was regulated by making use of the capitrine and trainers of the trains circulating in line. In the stations there were agents, called doors , which provided for the other commercial and logistical tasks. The single management remained in force until 1979.

Operational central manager [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

With the opening of the route to Gela, which was equipped with automatic electric block with track circuits with fixed and reversible currents and operating central manager, the route to Valsavoia, (now Lentini branches) was temporarily enabled to local management with blockade Telephone waiting to activate the automatic block with reversible fixed currents and the centralized command of traffic. This was activated on January 28, 1981; After a period of pre-exercise all the stations, except for Scordia, Caltagirone and Gela, became unpresses and exerts on remote control from the central place of the DCO based in Caltagirone ^[21] .

As part of the functional and economic renovation plan of the national railway infrastructure by RFI, the line has also been affected, from July to December 2005 ^{[22] [23] [24]} from changes in operating and command technology by replacing the most complex automatic blocking system with “fixed currents” and binary circuits with the simplest counting electrical block system (BCA) and finally, on April 30, 2006, from Suppression of the DCO di Caltagirone headquarters by moving the complete remote control system to the Central Operational Management of Syracuse ^[25] . The Vituso stations, Priolo soprano and plain of the Lord after eliminating the crossing tracks were also abandoned ^[22] ; On October 18, 2005 it was definitively suppressed Piana del Lord ^[23] , on March 19, 2006 that of Vituso ^[26] . Subsequently, on June 27, 2010, ^[27] The DCO remote control of the entire line was transferred to Palermo ^[28]

Main stations [ change | Modifica Wikitesto ]

• Lentini branch station (until the seventies Valsavoia ) Various tracks, water supply for steam locomotive, charger top, coil bridge and limit shape.
• Scordia station, various tracks and freight airport with pesters; Connection connection with citrus establishment (definitively deactivated), water supply for steam locomotives.
• Militello station, freight beam and charger plan.
• Grammichele station, freight beam, charger plan, limit shape and weighs carts, water supply.
• Caltagirone station (old, in operation until 1978); Various tracks, locomotive storage, single management, personal dormitory, water supply, swivel platform, reduced gauge tracks for Piazza Armerina line.
• Caltagirone station (new) various tracks, locomotive, personal dormitory, freight beam.
• Niscemi station, various tracks and goods beam.
• Gela station, large goods square and five tracks for travelers; Terminal container.

The line was open to exercise with the use of steam traction. Over time, various locomotives have been used including:

Starting from the second half of the 1930s, traveler services were improved with the introduction of automators:

Since the beginning of the seventies, the freight service has had a greater impulse with the replacement of steam locomotives with the new diesel-electric locomotives:

And the replacement of the now obsolete automators with:

• Automators ALN 668 1500 and 1600 series. Subsequently and occasionally the 1000 and 3000 series also appeared

In recent years, the presence on the section of:

• Ettore Caliri, Freezing 15 years later , in Trains today , n. 150, Etr Edizioni, 1994.
• Michele Manio, Arcide Hicy, The enhancement and the new system of the Lentini D.NE-GELA line , in The professional technique , Rome, Cifi, 1970.
• State Railways, Palermo, Circulation file lines of the peripheral unit , edition in force since 24 September 1995, pp. 129-139.
• State Railways, Palermo, General service time , valid from 31 May 1981 to 28 May 1983, file 152a.
• Ferrovie dello Stato, Palermo, general service time valid from 28 May 1995 to 31 May 1997.
• Massimo Inzerilli, Sicilian railways abandoned , in I Treni , n. 356, February 2013, pp. 20-26.
• Massimo Inzerilli, Return to Caltagirone , in itreni , n. 424, April 2019, pp. 10-13.
• Aldo Lo Monte, CTC in Caltagirone , in Trains today , n. 10, June 1981.
• Renzo Marini, The new Caltagirone-Gela railway , in Railway engineering , n. 11, Rome, Cifi, 1969.
• Italian railway network, Line file 154 , RFI, first publication December 2003, ISBN not existing. URL consulted on October 22, 2014 (archived by URL Original on August 8, 2014) .
• Giuseppe Sergi, New Caltagirone -Gela railway , in “The trains today” n. 1 (September 1980).