"Martin Theodor Ludwig" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 19 Jul 2006 18:18:19 +0100, "Nige" wrote:

Further up the valley is the summit and the Col du Somport.
Below is the tunnel linking France with Spain that has not been in use
since an accident in 1970. The wonderful CANFRANC station was going to
be
an International border station but is now in a bit of a sorry state.

It appears that the old railway tunnel has now been opened for road use
and so links France and Spain at this point.

Not quite correct - there was a new road tunnel built a few years ago.
And in the old rail tunnel I've observed some work - as the rumour got
it, it's slightly(?) refurbished that it can be used for emergencies or
evacuation of the (almost parallel) road tunnel.

Regards, Martin

Oh I thought they had used the route of the old rail tunnel - but looking at
this very informative piece, it seems that the old rail tunnel is as you say
used for emergency evacuations. QUOTE: A novelty for two-way tunnels is that
this tunnel will be equipped with evacuation galleries every 400 metres
connected to the railway tunnel, not in use at the present time. When this
railway tunnel is reopened in the future, the mission of the galleries will
be double, attending to the safety in both tunnels.UNQUOTE So it seems that
the rail line may also open in the future !
http://www.ita-aites.org/cms/835.html