Scala Gallery
Wherever possible, the route of the Bernina Railway was laid out with the view in mind. You can still see this today. After leaving Ospizio Bernina – the highest point of the route at 2,253 metres – the railway turns towards Alp Grüm, passing through the Scala Gallery.
Yet this pass has been a link for thousands of years – Stone Age finds prove that the Bernina was used as a pass even in prehistoric times. On 5 July 1910, a train travelled from St. Moritz to Tirano for the first time – four years of construction, thousands of Italian workers, the highest mountains.
Up here, little has changed since then. Two ABe 4/4 III railcars of the Rhaetian Railway lead the train through the landscape – without a rack-and-pinion system, without a summit tunnel, relying solely on friction and gradient, up to seven per cent in some places. The route has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2008.
It is the cover image of the German issue of the book “Alpine Railways” – and almost didn’t come to be. I had often walked past this spot, just 30–40 metres away. This time, however, I took a closer look. On that day, it was the last train in daylight. And then they came – two ABe 4/4 III – in service on the Bernina Railway since 1988, striking, angular, unmistakable. They were taken out of regular service at the end of 2023.
