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Cape to Cairo Railway
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Cape to Cairo Railway
The Cape to Cairo Railway is an unfinished project to create a railway line crossing from southern to northern Africa. It would have been the largest, and most important, railway of the continent. It was planned as a link between Cape Town in South Africa and Port Said in Egypt.
The project was never completed. Completed parts have been inoperative for many years, as a result of wars and lack of maintenance by the former colonies and current governments.
The plan was initiated at the end of the 19th century, during the time of Western European colonial rule. It was largely based on the vision of Cecil Rhodes, an attempt to connect African colonies of the British Empire through a continuous railway line from Cape Town, South Africa to Cairo, Egypt.
The original proposal for a Cape Town to Cairo railway was made in 1874 by Edwin Arnold, then the editor of The Daily Telegraph. The proposal for a railroad connecting Cairo with the Cape of Good Hope was later promoted by Cecil Rhodes, who enthused that such a railway could join up the possessions of the British Empire. Lacking government funding, private investors constructed a substantial part of the railroad. However, construction began to stall in the 1920s when air cargo and low cost ship transport provided viable alternatives.
France had a somewhat rival strategy in the late 1890s to link its western and eastern African colonies, namely Senegal to French Somaliland. Southern Sudan and Ethiopia were in the way, but France sent expeditions in 1897 to establish a protectorate in southern Sudan and to find a route across Ethiopia. The scheme foundered when a British flotilla on the Nile confronted the French expedition at the point of intersection between the French and British routes, leading to the Fashoda Incident and eventual French retreat. Another proposed project, the Trans-Saharan Railway, which planned to connect colonial Algeria to sub-Saharan Africa by rail, saw little progress before abandonment.
The Portuguese considered an Angola to Mozambique railway to link west with east and produced the "Pink Map" representing their claims to sovereignty in Africa (to link Angola and Mozambique). These plans ended after the 1890 British Ultimatum.
Egypt has a rail system that, as early as 1854, connected Port Said, Alexandria and Cairo, and currently goes as far south as Aswan. In Egypt the railway is 1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge. After a ferry link on the Nile, the railway continues in Sudan from Wadi Halfa to Khartoum at the 1,067 mm (3 ft 6 in) Cape gauge (see Northern Africa Railroad Development). This part of the system was started by Lord Kitchener in 1897 to provide supplies during his war against the Mahdist State. Further railway links go south, the most southern point being Wau.
Opposition to British rule in South Africa was settled after the First and Second Boer Wars (the wars ended in 1902, but the new Union of South Africa did not incorporate its two states until 1910).
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Cape to Cairo Railway
The Cape to Cairo Railway is an unfinished project to create a railway line crossing from southern to northern Africa. It would have been the largest, and most important, railway of the continent. It was planned as a link between Cape Town in South Africa and Port Said in Egypt.
The project was never completed. Completed parts have been inoperative for many years, as a result of wars and lack of maintenance by the former colonies and current governments.
The plan was initiated at the end of the 19th century, during the time of Western European colonial rule. It was largely based on the vision of Cecil Rhodes, an attempt to connect African colonies of the British Empire through a continuous railway line from Cape Town, South Africa to Cairo, Egypt.
The original proposal for a Cape Town to Cairo railway was made in 1874 by Edwin Arnold, then the editor of The Daily Telegraph. The proposal for a railroad connecting Cairo with the Cape of Good Hope was later promoted by Cecil Rhodes, who enthused that such a railway could join up the possessions of the British Empire. Lacking government funding, private investors constructed a substantial part of the railroad. However, construction began to stall in the 1920s when air cargo and low cost ship transport provided viable alternatives.
France had a somewhat rival strategy in the late 1890s to link its western and eastern African colonies, namely Senegal to French Somaliland. Southern Sudan and Ethiopia were in the way, but France sent expeditions in 1897 to establish a protectorate in southern Sudan and to find a route across Ethiopia. The scheme foundered when a British flotilla on the Nile confronted the French expedition at the point of intersection between the French and British routes, leading to the Fashoda Incident and eventual French retreat. Another proposed project, the Trans-Saharan Railway, which planned to connect colonial Algeria to sub-Saharan Africa by rail, saw little progress before abandonment.
The Portuguese considered an Angola to Mozambique railway to link west with east and produced the "Pink Map" representing their claims to sovereignty in Africa (to link Angola and Mozambique). These plans ended after the 1890 British Ultimatum.
Egypt has a rail system that, as early as 1854, connected Port Said, Alexandria and Cairo, and currently goes as far south as Aswan. In Egypt the railway is 1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge. After a ferry link on the Nile, the railway continues in Sudan from Wadi Halfa to Khartoum at the 1,067 mm (3 ft 6 in) Cape gauge (see Northern Africa Railroad Development). This part of the system was started by Lord Kitchener in 1897 to provide supplies during his war against the Mahdist State. Further railway links go south, the most southern point being Wau.
Opposition to British rule in South Africa was settled after the First and Second Boer Wars (the wars ended in 1902, but the new Union of South Africa did not incorporate its two states until 1910).
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